The Jade Phantom
by Husbamf
Summary: I've always made them regret breaking up with me; tease and torment them. I never noticed that there's always been one constant good thing. Cat. She's always been... Cat. I couldn't hurt her, not really. I think she's always known that. It took me a while to see it; now lines are being blurred and everything's at risk. I'll do whatever it takes to make things right. Cade/OOC Beck.
1. Changes and New Ideas

**Disclaimer: Would I be writing fanfictions that contain femslash if I owned/wrote Victorious?  
… Or any other TV show (or in **_**Phantom of the Opera**_**'s case, Opera) for that matter? No, I wouldn't. Because if I did I'd just make it happen.  
But parents would get mad or I'd get sued, then everybody would be upset and I'd be broke.**

I like singing and acting, it's almost a reflex. So when everyone agreed to cast Beck and I for the lead of _Phantom of __the Opera_, I was ecstatic. It would have been perfect. I mean, Beck's perfect. Kind of. Almost. He's handsome, kind, a good actor, and a great boyfriend. But there was always something missing. Something we had and lost a long time ago. Why change something 'good', something seemingly stable? Tori Vega. She just had to take him away, just had to show him that she's got everything we lost. I should have saw it coming.

Fine. It's fine. You know why? Because Jade West is always fine, Jade West doesn't hurt.

Just like every other weekday I walked into the auditorium where the rest of Beck's friends were waiting. What? They're not my friends, more like people who look at me cautiously and acknowledge when I'm around. Besides Cat, anyway. Cat and I have had some sort of strange twist of a friendship since forever. She's different, that's the only explanation I can give you.

Five seconds into the rehearsal I realized I'm not as good of an actress as I thought I was. It was way too soon to be this close to Beck. Especially since I could practically smell Tori on him. He reeked of her scent… coconut? Something stupid like that. I hate coconuts, it made me nauseous.

After I excused myself I ran to the bathroom and splashed some cold water on my face. _Get a grip. Jade West doesn't hurt. Jade West doesn't cry. Jade West is always fine._ I repeated the mantra over and over until the door opened, breaking me from the trance.

"Jade?" A small voice questioned before a flash of red burned my eyes.

I took a moment to make sure my voice was fine. "Yeah. What's up, Cat?"

"You were taking a long time, so… Are you okay?" She stood in the door way, a concerned look on her face. None of this is uncommon; her sincerity, compassion, tentativeness. I have a reputation to uphold, I can't let her see anything; gotta be strong. "Di-did something happen?"

"No, so just…" I almost told her off like everyone else, anger spewing dangerously from my voice. But I figured I must as well tell her, she'll find out eventually. And if it's not from me directly she'll probably freak out. Why didn't I tell her in the bathroom, are we not friends anymore, don't I trust her… Definitely a good idea to just get it over with and tell her now. I tried to hold the annoyance back and talk with as much indifference as possible. "Actually, yeah. Beck and I broke up. Pretty sure he's with Vega now."

If I didn't know better, I would've thought I saw some sort of hope flash across her face. That must've been Cat being happy for Tori before realizing the situation again. "Oh, Jade… I'm so sorry, please don't be sad. I don't like it when you're sad." I raised an eyebrow at her as she grabbed me into an awkward hug. "You'll always have me!"

And then it hit me. The brilliant idea that could not only get me better grades, but solve my Beck-and-Tori problem as well. I pulled out of the hug but held on to Cat's arms and stared at her. It's perfect. She's perfect for this, there's nobody else. Practically dragging her, I raced us back to the auditorium.

"We're recasting!" I shouted over the light murmur of people chatting in the background.

A rumbling "What?" echoed through from everyone else. I chuckled at their uneasiness. This would change everything.

"That's right; we're going to make this better. Cat's going to act as Christine." I placed Cat in front of me for everyone to see. I smirked at her shocked expression.

"What are you going to be then?" Beck asked, his tone both curious and amused.

"Congratulations on the part Cat!" Tori chirped in, probably delighted that Beck isn't coupled with me for this anymore. Don't get me wrong, she's not the only one.

"_I'm_ going to be the Phantom, of course." I sneered devilishly at their reactions. "You all put me as co-organizer of this, remember? I'm the one who knows the story best, and let's just say I'm… changing it a little bit." They're not going to know what hit them. Nobody is.

"What? Who am I supposed to be then?" Beck yelped, probably thinking I dropped him from the cast. Hey, maybe that'd be a better idea. But it'd cause so much drama, and teenage drama isn't what I do. Angst, maybe. But not drama. Taking him off the lead and not having to work with him in a couple-like situation is good enough for me.

"Raoul, you can be Raoul. You know, the Vicomte de Chagny guy." Before Sinjin could object to his role being taken, I spoke again. "Sinjin can go back to … doing something else, like lighting, or _watching_." I shot a glare his way and he shut up.

"No other changes, right? I'm still Carlotta?" Tori asked while patting Beck. To everyone else he shrugged his demotion off, but I could see the steam pouring from his ears.

"You're still Carlotta, nobody else is changing. There's also going to be a twist to the story, I guess I'll rewrite the scripts for Friday." I frowned and wondered if I'd have enough time to do that. There were a lot of characters, many things to fix or alter if this were to work.

"I can help you!" Cat looped herself under my arm so I hugged her shoulders and cheered me on. "It'll be great, we can use rainbow gel-pens and write everybody's script in different colors and maybe I can help you with the changes, can I help you with the changes? I can help with changing things, I'm good at-"

"Do me a favor and breathe, will you? And fine, you can come over tonight." I rolled my eyes as she squealed with happiness. I swear, if I wasn't tugging her shoulders down she'd be bouncing off the walls with glee.

What did I just agree to?

* * *

**A/N : Gasp. What's Jade's new idea, the change she's making to _Phantom of the Opera_?  
****What's going to happen to them tonight?**

**There you have it, my first and unedited fanfiction chapter.  
I'm actually kind of afraid to say it, but… I'd appreciate it if you read and review.**

**This was probably really OOC/some things are off- don't hurt me! I've only seen… probably two Victorious episodes total?  
But I read the fanfictions a lot, that's got to count for something, right?  
Why am I ending my sentences in questions?  
Make it stop!**

… **I'm not crazy, really. -squint-.**


	2. A Sleeping Cat and Self Questions

**Disclaimer: Victorious… Psh, if I owned that I'd be in it. And I'd be dating-  
Oh ho ho, you're not going to find out who. You know why? Because I don't own Victorious, never will.**

* * *

I walked down the hallway, still wondering if it really was a good idea that I'd volunteered to alter everything. Sure, Cat could help me, but it's Cat. There's only so much she can do, you know? And sometimes she's distracting. Where the fuck-? She's different which makes her distracting, that's it, yeah.

After taking some extra things I forgot in my locker, I walked back to the auditorium to pick up Cat and drive her home with me. I was surprised to see that she wasn't there.

I looked around for a familiar face; one that I didn't want to bash in, that is. "Hey Andre, have you seen Cat?"

"No, not since you left." Andre swiveled his head around to scan the thinning crowd. "I thought she went with you."

"Well, she didn't. I'm going to go find her, thanks." I stomped off and went on my search to find Cat. You'd think she'd have the brains to stay put when I'm going to be taking her home. I tried to call her phone, but it went to voicemail. So back on my mission I went. The first stop was her locker, but no Cat there. Next were some of the classrooms, then the bathroom, random hallways, and where she usually was outside.

An unsuccessful hour later, I decided to call it quits and just go home. Everybody else was long gone, so she must've gone already. Tired, I pulled out my keys and went to open the car door when I saw something that caught my eye. Velvet red hair. And there she was, curled up like a kitten sleeping next to my car. Stupid, why didn't I check the parking lot? Cat was waiting for me all along.

She looked so… cute? I don't know, I guess more than usual is why I noticed. I knelt down next to her to wake her up, but I couldn't bring myself to. Her mouth twitched a bit as she slept, breath steady and calm unlike her usual nature. Kind of like a real cat. I really didn't want to wake her. I don't think I could if I tried. You know, like stepping on fresh snow or drawing on a blank sheet of paper, you hesitate. It was only when Cat shivered that I realized it was time to go. She'd taken off her sweater and was using it like a pillow against the ground; of course she was feeling a chill.

I opened the back seat door and threw her bag in the passenger's seat.

Cat made a sleepy moan sound as I picked her up. "Mm... Are we going somewhere?" She mumbled, still half asleep.

The affect it had on me was alarming. Jade West does _not_ spontaneously want to hug people until they implode. That's just not me. "Yeah, you fell asleep next to my car, and now I'm taking you home." Cat didn't respond, she went back to sleep.

I laid her down gently in the back and drove back to her house. The ride was silent besides some soft snoring and more mumbling from the sleeping Cat. Throughout the drive I started to wonder... Why didn't I just kick Cat awake like I'd do anyone else? Why aren't I trying to get back at Tori anymore? Most importantly, where the hell did all these questions come from? I never question myself. _Ever_. The silence, it must have been made me crazy.

We were in Cat's driveway relatively fast, which gave me no time to figure out what kind of crazy was going on with me.  
7:16 PM. That's the time that blinked back at me when I checked my phone. Not only did I waste a few hours that could've been spent modifying the script, but I also missed dinner. Great.

"Hey Cat, wake up." Shoving her lightly, I started to grow annoyed. "It's getting late, and you're wasting my time."

Another sleepy moan. "Huh? What time is it, where are we?" She replied groggily.

"We're at your house, you fell asleep. It's 7:18, like I said, getting late." Still leaning over my car's seat, I glared a bit. "Now get out of my car because both of us need dinner and I need to start on that writing." She bolted upright, almost smashing her head against the car's ceiling.

"Ohmygod! Jade I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep it's just you left so I ran after you but you were gone and then I thought maybe you went to go home already so I ran to find you but you weren't at your car or the stage and then you weren't at your locker so I went back to the car but it was still there and so waited and waited and-"

"It's fine." I interrupted her with an unhappy tone. Shut up, you know I could've done a lot worse.

"No, it's not! I'm really sorry; I can still help you, right? We're already here, just come in. You can stay for dinner?" She smiled at me hopefully. That shouldn't work on me.

My eyes rolled out of reflex, and I kept the half glare on my face. Cat knows I don't like dealing with people. Kind of have a general misanthropy thing going on. Especially at family dinners that aren't mine, they're awkward and stupid. Even if it wasn't for that, the self interrogation on the way over's made me feel weird around her. "You know I don't feel comfortable with that."

"My parents aren't home!" Cat blurts out. From the looks of it, I'm going to have to give in or she'll be shattered. "They're out at some thing with my brother and won't be back until late. It's just us, okay?"

I sigh. Yup, have to give in. "Yeah, okay."

We exit the car and before I know it, she's taken my hand and started dragging me into her empty house.  
And then it hit me like a bus.

We're... _alone_.

* * *

**A/N: The chapter feels weird to me.  
But nevertheless this is going up like the other one, unedited. **

****

Read it. Review it. _**Do it**_**.**

Maybe you can tell me why it feels weird.  
Or maybe you like it, and then I'll say you're weird.  
But I like weird people, so you're cool with me.  
We can get beat up by the normal people together!


	3. Plushies, Pizza, and a Picture?

****

**Disclaimer: Dude, it's only been… one day. Or something like that.  
I didn't own Victorious a few days ago or yesterday, so what makes you think I do now?  
****Oh, you think I'm so awesome that I'm capable of taking over the World/TV industry in a few days if I tried?  
Aww, you're so nice.**

* * *

Cat didn't really give me time to panic too much. After one second she'd dragged me upstairs and we pretty much flew into her room. I thought I went blind.

Posters of various boy bands and her favorite movies plastered her wall; plushies from miniature to life sized were scattered everywhere in an untidy mess. It was expected, childish, just like her. You could almost see her talking to all of her toys about her day or holding a concert for them. Most of her other things were sparkling, as if in covered in sparkles or sequins. Thus is why I say I thought I went blind. Hell, I think even saw some mini disco balls lying around. Besides the heap of random junk she bought from the phase she had with that stupid magazine, everything else was red. Her sheets, blankets, curtains, they were all a deep velvet red. Just like her hair. It was almost like it was trying to seduce you into reaching over and touching it.

Cat let go of my hand to try clear bits of her room up and straighten her sheets out. It was kinda funny, like watching the ten second tidy on _The Big Comfy Couch_. Every now and then she'd look over her shoulder as if to check if I was still in the doorway. It made me wonder why she thought I'd leave without saying anything. Eh, I guess I do that sometimes, but that's only when I'm annoyed because someone's done something stupid.

After a minute or two she plopped down on her bed and patted the empty spot next to her. Cat's bright smile greeted me when I went to sit next to her, but it slowly turned into a slightly awkward one as silence surrounded us. Like a giant purple polka dotted elephant had walked into the room, it was odd. Not because it was awkward, more like the awkwardness made it hard for me to meet her gaze. That's never happened before. I don't get confused like this, nobody does this to me... Argh, you know what? Fuck it! I'm Jade West, I speak what I think and everything else can just play itself out. Things are going to go back to being uncomplicated because I'm just going to let whatever happen, happen. I'll deal with it honestly then. No point screwing myself over now.

Cat broke the silence with a simple question. "Um, do you want something to eat?"

"Uh, sure." I frowned, finally noticing the emptiness of my stomach. "What're we having?"

"I don't know, what do you want?" The nervous smile didn't leave yet, and she wasn't babbling. She wasn't at emotional extremes, either. A calm and serious Cat? Weird things getting weirder.

Not really caring what was for dinner, I answered with something like "We can order out?"

Cat stumbled across the room and started tearing up her bag for something. It took a few seconds of watching her search around before I realized she was looking for money to buy dinner with. Smiling, I reached into my pocket and pull out a fifty.

"Hey Cat?" I smirked at her, waving the bill in front of her face. "I'll buy, alright? Don't bother arguing with me, I've invaded your house so at least let me buy you a pizza or something."

"'Kay 'kay!" She smiled a happy smile, and it was a relief to see it wasn't that hesitant one again. I could tell it was real because her eyes lit up, kind of like they were smiling before her face did. "You wait here, I'm going to go order and I'll be right back!"

A blink later and she'd already left the room, muffled thuds telling me she'd leapt down the stairs. I figured she wouldn't be back for a while, so I went to lie down on her bed. Her sheets were soft, pillow velvety and fluffy. It had her smell, strawberries… and cream, I'm guessing? Either way it was almost sickly sweet but I found I didn't want to move away.

Rolling to my side I snaked an arm underneath the pillow to hug it and immediately pulled my hand back in slight pain. There was a bit of blood on my fingertips, a paper cut? I picked up the pillow and froze.

There was a picture of me, smiling like I'd won a million bucks. Clearly taped onto my picture was a cut out one of Cat, posed like she was kissing my cheek. The picture made it look like we were both really happy, and... kind of together? I mean, I was smiling! A _real _smile! I don't know where or when it was from but I can't remember a time when I've smiled that hard. The picture seemed worn and kind of old-ish, and there were small stain like markings on it. Before I could figure out if those were tear marks I was interrupted by a thud noise coming from the door.

"_Hello? Are you still there, miss?_" A man's voice was speaking loudly from the phone that was now spinning on the floor. Cat was standing frozen in the doorway, looking like… I can't really describe it properly. The trademark "_What's that supposed to mean?"_ look was glued to her face.

Quickly I jumped off the bed and grabbed the phone. "Sorry, she had to… go do something. What do you need?"

"_Oh, ahem… Your friend already picked out the specifics on everything, all that's left is your pizza's toppings?" _He sounded rather confused. I wouldn't blame him.

"Uh..." I looked in Cat's direction. Still unmoving. Okay then. "Just pepperoni, I guess. Actually, no, throw on some mushrooms and green peppers too."

"_That will be $39.95, and it will arrive in about twenty to thirty minutes._"

"Alright. Thanks, bye." I hung up before he could respond.

I moved in slow motion to stand up and face Cat. She wasn't saying anything or moving, just frozen there. My voice was as slow as I moved. "_Caaaaat…?_" I started waving one of my hands a little to catch her attention. Her eyes started tearing up and I realized I was actually waving the picture in front of her face. "Are you alright, Cat? We've gotta talk abou-"

Before I knew what was happening the door slammed in my face, and I heard her take off sprinting across the house.  
Fuck.

* * *

**A/N:  
I already told you I don't edit my chapters, so no surprise there.  
I also don't post up a new chapter until I'm done the one that comes after it-  
Oh no, now you know my other secret.  
Please hold still while I get my taser. It won't hurt, really.**

**Thanks to those who reviewed!  
I like this chapter better than the last, though.  
Yeah yeah, I update daily/fast. Is that a bad thing?  
I have too much time on my hands, okay. ;_;**

**In the meanwhile, you should review.  
'cause if you don't review, how am I suppose to know?  
Then I'll have to beat you up because you're keeping secrets from me.  
God _damn_ I thought we were friends. No more 4am booty calls for you.**


	4. Hide and Seek in the House

**Disclaimer: You still don't get it, do you?**  
**Okay. Let me put it this way. The day I own Victorious is the day I get turned into a magical Hamster and find the girl of my dreams. Together we brave the horribleness of trying to turn me back into a human and _BAM_, (after 2 uncut hours of pure action) we find out the answer is as simple as a kiss. Don't you just hate it when that happens?**

* * *

I was a bit stunned for a few seconds. I mean, the door _was_ a millimeter off breaking my nose. Nevertheless, I quickly regained myself and ran out after her. Looking left and right I realized she must've gone to the first floor level to hide. I slid down the banister to the main hall and almost smashed into several picture frames. When I regained my balance I stood still and listened for some sort of clue. There was none; besides my own thoughts the house was dead quiet. _Shit shit shit, ughhh… Why, Cat? So maybe you have a crush on me. Or something. I don't know. But I'm not that much of a close minded bitch to freak out at you about it. You know that!_

Trying to remember every room I checked while making sure she wasn't secretly escaping behind my back wasn't an easy task. First I crept my way into the living room, slowly tip toeing my way in before suddenly dropping on all fours to check underneath the table and sofas. Nothing. No red hair clashing with the other colors, just bruising knees. The kitchen was next, seeing as it was the room over. There wasn't really any place to hide in there, but I checked all the cabinets and behind some appliances anyway. I even looked under the sink. She could've been there! You never know. Searching the basement took ages because I was determined to be thorough. There were nooks and crannies everywhere, loads of places for her to easily hide from me. After moving what seemed like a hundred boxes and even more dust bunnies, there was still no Cat.

After that I started to get a bit nervous, a bit worried. And somewhat annoyed. Not the kitchen, living room, or basement. Not in her own room, and I was almost one hundred percent sure she wasn't in her parents or brother's room either. It didn't sound like she went that way. What was left? No way Cat would've left her own house to flee from me- or would she? She did seem really freaked out. Where the hell would she go, though? And it's dangerous out there. Then I remembered something. Hi, I'm Jade, and I'm _stupid_. I forgot the bathroom. Mental slap myself.

Sure enough, she was in the bathroom. I was going to just open the door and walk in when I realized… I didn't know what to say. Then again, when did I ever? I usually just said whatever I thought, no censor or planning out. It's just it looked like I needed to know what to do before I went in, her hiccupping sobs started to make that clear. It sounded like she was trying to stop crying so that I wouldn't find her, but it clearly wasn't working.

I turned the doorknob slowly and it made a loud creak. Great. "Hey Cat? I'm going to come in, alright?" No response. But the sobbing stopped. Just some sniffling and hiccupping now. I opened the door and saw her sitting in the empty bathtub, curled up and hugging herself with the shower curtain drawn as if to protect her. It didn't really make sense, but it hurt me to see her like that. Kind of different than the usual friendship pact. It made me soft, what I'd usually call weak or pathetic, and surprisingly, I didn't mind. I don't think I'd mind being any or all of those things if it meant she didn't feel like this again.

Stuck in whatever that feeling or state was, I knelt down and pulled the curtain aside. Cat had this scared, hurt look on her face like I was going to hurt her. It made me ... concerned? Like I said before, I don't censor myself. She had good reason to look like I was going to hurt her, because I accidentally might. Gently I grasped her hands and removed them from the tight hold she had on herself. I spoke softly, softness doesn't hurt. "Cat, you know, I'm not-"

_Ding Dong_

I didn't move.

"We should, um, we should probably get that." She sniffled and started to get up.

I stopped spacing out and realized I didn't want her dealing with the delivery guy. "I got it."

We walked to the door together and I paid the guy the fifty. Then he tipped his uniform hat to Cat behind me, winked, and walked away. I glared to his back and rolled my eyes. Cat quickly took the food from me. Two pizzas, some fries, wings and few cans of soda. Way too much for just the both of us, but I guess she wanted variety.

"You know, it's a good thing you tipped him well," she tried to laugh but sniffled at the same time. "I heard from Robbie who knows the girl down the block who's dating one of the guys that has a brother that works in delivery and he said that if you don't tip them well enough they spit in your food!"

Cat lead us to the living room and placed the boxes on a table near the sofa. She sat down and opened the boxes, nodding her head with each correct order. I sat down next to her and started to space out while watching her again. She kept going on about all the horrible things that delivery boys could do, how disgusting it would be if we weren't nice to them. Hair in the food, booger in the food, yadda yadda radda.

But she never looked me in the eye. Cat kept distracting herself by doing something. Fiddling with the boxes, using arm gestures, anything. I cut her off by putting a hand on one of hers to still it. Unfortunately, it made her expression change back to the one in the bathroom. Definitely not what I was going for there. Facepalm.

Hoping she would get what I meant, I kept a light hold on her hand while leaning back on the couch. She mimicked my movement and leaned back as well, but instead of resting her head on the couch she placed it against my shoulder. Good, it worked. Cat usually got these small things I did, things nobody else got. Neither of us could look at the other this time, though. Again, I really didn't know what to say. What did I do? What _do_ I do? I'm not used to this planning-what-you-think thing, especially not now. She just felt so fragile.

"Jade, do you hate me?" She said in an almost inaudible whisper. If her face wasn't buried in the crook of my neck I probably wouldn't have heard it. Her voice still had the crack in it as though she was ready to cry again.

I took the one hand of hers I was holding and looped my fingers through hers. "No, I don't hate you." An honest answer. A bit uneasy, I started tracing her fingers to keep myself calm. Light touches like I'd break her fingers if I wasn't careful."But I've got to know something, Cat. Can I?"

She didn't verbally respond. Against my neck I felt her frown and bite her lower lip, and a few seconds later she tapped her fingers on mine in response. I took that as a yes. I hoped. Feeling the unusual sensation of my heartbeat pounding away in my ears, I inhaled deeply and breathed out the question. I could guess or assume all I wanted, but to know for sure I had to hear it from her.

"Do you like me?"

* * *

**A/N:**  
**_DingDingDing!_**  
**Congratulations, you are now the winner of a cliffhanger.**  
**Huzzah.**

**As usual I feel weird about my chapters and I ask you to review.**  
**If you do, you get e-hugs! E-hugs to all who review(ed)!**  
**And cookies. You like cookies, don't you?**

**But if you don't I'll show up with a permanent marker-**  
**Yes, a _permanent_ marker, and graffiti on your face. Like a jigglypuff!**

**And to those who are curious about the actual script/Phantom of the Opera rewrite, ****that's coming.  
Should be chapter after next or so. Something like that, I think.**

P.S.  
Strong-Coffee: In exchange for making me happy, you get a 4am booty call, yay!  
And by booty call I obviously mean a text saying "_God damnit I can't beat the final boss, climb in through my window and come help me now._" ./nerd


	5. Answers, 11:11 and Realization

****

**Disclaimer: I totally, totally own Victorious.  
… But only in my dreams. And only on every second weekend. **

* * *

Cat nodded her head slowly. Almost like a real cat getting her ears scratched. I'm guessing she didn't trust her voice then. There had to be something to say, right? I'd even settle for something unoriginal that anybody would say when moments like these happen. Nadda. Nothing came to mind. Just as tension started to build, she jerked out of the comfortable position but kept our hands entwined.

"I-I know it might be awkward, or something. Maybe not as awkward as the time I walked in on you and Beck, but still really awkward. But it doesn't have to be! Really, really doesn't have to be awkward, because it's okay that you don't like me because I mean, you liked Beck and everything and we can still be friends, right? I still-" She kept going, and going, and going. If her hair was lighter and pink, I'd get her a drum and call her the Energizer Bunny. It was weird because it wasn't awkward, not really, anyway. More along the lines of… Hard to put thoughts into words. There was something I wanted to say; just I couldn't put my finger on what it was or how to say it right. I could've tried to explain it to her, but this didn't really seem like a good time. Especially not when-

"Jade? Jade! Please say something!" Cat caught my attention by pretty much jumping on me. I guess I spaced out longer than I thought, as she had an even more worried look on her face than before. "Don't hate me! Let's just go back to being friends, I still like you- Not like-like you, well, that too but- _Ohhh!_ I'm sorry!"

Tears started to pour in her eyes, and I'm pretty sure she was trying to talk but it came out as high speed gibberish through her hiccups. It caught me a bit off guard since I was in my own world a few seconds ago; to be honest, I was a bit alarmed.

After two seconds I snapped out of it and grabbed a tissue from the table. I tapped her uncomfortably and started to gently wipe her face. Eventually the waterworks slowed to a stop, but neither of us said anything. It remained quiet because… Still no idea what to say, and I guess she was thinking. What the hell _do_ you say when someone says they like you? Okay, yeah, maybe I know how to answer that, but it's not simple this time. I don't want to shoot her down, but the other option's… complicated. I need time to process it all before I can let everything go with the flow, y'know?

"You… want a drink or something?" It felt stupid to ask. Excessive crying makes people thirsty though, right? Something to do with dehydration. Maybe I didn't sleep through the entire class, so what. Oh wait, she nodded. "Okay, so… how about we eat, alright? Food's gonna get cold. And I don't hate you." I had to throw it in casually. Any other way would be too unlike me. Plus she might actually be hungry, what with it being late and all the crying. My stomach punched me as a reminder that I was hungry too.

We opened the pizza box and took a slice each. I think I polished off two and some fries by the time she finished nibbling on her one. Almost desperate for some sound, I opened two cans of soda and passed one over to Cat. Must as well say something. Anything to clear this up.

"Look Cat, I really don't hate you." I looked in the opposite direction. She kept staring downwards but turned towards me. "I don't know what else you want me to say."

Cat leaned back on the couch and brought her knees up to hug herself into a ball. Her confusion, the argument in her mind showed through another painful facial expression. Not what I was going for there. "Why didn't you leave?"

I was a bit shocked. "Do you want me to?"

She jumped a bit. "No, no! I just… I said I l-like you and I guess you don't hate me because you've already said you don't hate me, but what… what happens now? I just thought you'd l-leave." It sounded like she was just waiting for me to freak out. Reasonable, I guess.

Usually by now I'd have told her to quit worrying and lay off already. Then again, if it was anyone else I'd probably have already shot them down and told them to fuck off. I suppose trying to explain would at least be better than what's happened now. "I don't know what to tell you. I need… I need time, Cat. We can still be friends, but I need time to think about-" I cut off to make a hand gesture between us. "This."

"'Kay kay." She didn't seem sad or happy. Not sure how to describe it, maybe thinking or determined. Very unusual for Cat.

"And if it seems like… whatever you normally worry about, I just have a lot on my mind, alright?" My brow furrowed at the mental list I remembered. "I've got that script rewrite to do on top of everything else, remember?"

Cat nodded her head and I saw the clock behind her. 11:03pm. Man, it got late fast.

"Holy fucking Christ it's late." Not like I usually sleep much, but like I said, got to work on those play modifications. Can't afford to lose those grades. "I'm gonna go home."

"Don't you want help with the rewrite?"

I thought about it for a second. For one, it was getting late. Cat wouldn't be able to stay up much longer anyway. Two, doing the fixing myself could benefit us. Okay, I just considered doing something to surprise someone else, that's definitely some… weird going on.

"No, it's okay. I think I'm going to do that alone, have an idea. So I'm gonna go." I repeated with a nod. When I got up to leave and Cat caught my hand. There was this quasi-shy look on her face.

"If y-you're really not mad, you'll stay tonight, 'kay?" She spoke softly, and tilted her head so she was looking at me through her eyelashes. It was a test, and if I didn't let her win this one she'd never forget it. If she wasn't just a rebound, if whatever the growing feeling was eventually took residence in me, I'd have to let her have this or she'd never believe me. If not then at least she'll have something to remember, right? Not like that, you idiots. Get your mind out of the gutter.

"Yeah, yeah. In that case-" Cat yawned and interrupted me. I tried to hide a small smile before responding. "If you're done?" She giggled and nodded. "In that case we should go to bed, somebody's sleepy." Not like me, not like me at all to say that. Damn it, West. Before she could protest I interrupted her. "I can work on the script tomorrow, don't worry about it." Yeah, don't worry about it. I'm freaking out enough by myself.

"Mm, kay kay." It looked like she was going to fall asleep at any moment, and that she seemed satisfied by my answer; at least enough to stand up and start walking with me back upstairs. The grip on my hand loosened as if to give me the option to let go, but I didn't mind, maybe even didn't want to, so I kept a light hold on hers until we reached her bed.

I figured I wouldn't bother asking if I should sleep on the floor or something, I had a feeling that would make her feel uneasy again. We lifted the blanket up at opposite ends and slid in next to each other like we normally would, no big deal. Cat would usually turn to face me and start on some mindless chatter until she talked or giggled herself to sleep. This time she just stared at the ceiling, occasionally checking the time. Eventually she looked over at me with a conflicted expression plastered across her face. You know, that one when you _know_ they're thinking about saying something but don't exactly know if they should say it.

I turned my head to the side and raised an eyebrow at her. "What's wrong?"

She looked a bit startled, like she didn't know I would notice she'd been staring at me. "You read my mind!"

"What?"

"Well, how else did you know I was thinking about something? Can you read everybody's mind, Jade? We could travel around the world in a wagon like the gypsies and you could read minds! You'd be like a superhero!" Cat started bouncing, which caused me to get shaken on the bed.

I rolled my eyes. "Quit bouncing, it was written on your face."

"What's that supposed to mean?" She made the trademark facial expression to go with it. "There are words on my face?"

"No, I-" I shut my eyes to prevent her from seeing me roll them again and tried not to sound too exasperated. "Yes Cat, I read your mind. It's only yours I can read, and I can only do it sometimes by accident." That should satisfy her. And possibly help me. "But I didn't do it right so I couldn't tell what's wrong."

"Oh, 'kay."

I waited for her to continue, but she didn't. "So?" She tilted her head and looked at me sideways; you could practically see a question mark blinking next to her head. "Aren't you going to tell me?"

She looked away and whispered. "It was 11:11."

"Annnnd?"

"Don't you know what 11:11 means, Jade?" Cat made it sound like it was the simplest thing on the planet and everybody knew what it was. I shot her a skeptical look. "Okay um, at 11:11 you make a wish, and it'll come true! Like wishing on a shooting star!"

"And that made you frown?" Again with the raised eyebrow.

"No, it was the wish." She pouted. "It was the wish's fault."

"What'd you wish for?"

Her eyebrows shot up through her forehead. "I can't tell you! It won't come true if I do!"

I put a straight face on. It wouldn't be a good idea to argue with Cat about magical things. No really, we tried and lost once; she went on for hours. "Okay, fine." I closed my eyes and after a minute or two assumed that was the end of our conversation.

"I can't tell you, but m-maybe I can s-s-show you?" I was about to open my eyes when she yelped. "Don't open your eyes! I-If you p-promise to keep your eyes closed, I'll show you."

After I agreed I felt the blankets move and heard Cat shimmying in the bed. She caught me trying to peek and slapped my shoulder lightly before telling me off with a soft, "Jade! No peeking, you promised!" I chuckled. Soon I felt her body get closer until she was lying on top of me. We moved into something like the couch position earlier, except this time lying down. Her arms hugged around my waist, head on my shoulder, and our legs sprawled out in some sort of tangled mess. It felt nice.

"This is what you wished for? You could've just-" Cat shushed me. I hmphed. She giggled. I turned my head and breathed in the sweet smell which was Cat's shampoo. She hugged me closer and I unintentionally sighed.

After a while I assumed she was asleep as her breathing was slow and even. I started to doze off as well when I felt one of her arms move up my body and to my face. She used a finger to draw a line up my jaw, I'm guessing to test if I was asleep or not. Being curious I decided to play along, and she tilted my head down slightly.

Cat lifted her head up and in what seemed to feel like slow motion, kissed me softly in a way that I don't think words have the capability to describe. It was sincere, shy, nervous, and somewhat bittersweet. Things like that don't happen to me, I don't let them. Half in shock and half because I didn't want to scare her by suddenly waking up, I didn't move besides letting my head roll back into our former sleeping position. She kept her eyes closed and snuggled into me once again. Everything pretty much slowed to a stop when I realized… I didn't even let _Beck_ do this. I'd just flinch and leave.

But now there's two things I think I know for certain.

Next week's going to be one Hell of a week to get by,  
and I've fallen for Cat Valentine.

* * *

**A/N:  
Yeah, that was a really long one, wasn't it-  
**_**THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID**_**.**

**Ahem. My sincerest apologies for the late update.  
I could bore you with the reasons why but then I'd have to kill you because you'd know too much.**

**There be more to come, though.  
You know, 'cause there's things missing from the story.  
I'd threaten you into reviewing again but I've been up for 48 hours and am sleepy. T_T  
You're spared for now. But you should do it anyway because I spared you. 8D**

**Thanks to those of you who did slap up that review button.  
… though now I owe a bunch of you booty calls.  
It was worth it.**

P.S. Special thanks to Uncle Pasty (who isn't really an uncle but is actually a teenage ex of mine – Can you spell plot twist?) for helping me out and shoving me to update.


	6. Day Dreams and an Interruption

**Disclaimer: I'll be the owner of Victorious after I win the lottery and become a Prince (not King, too much responsibility and whatnot). Which will be in approximately... never. Only because I'm the wrong gender to be a Prince and a few months shy of being able to buy a lottery ticket. Obviously if I was eighteen and male I'd be the nonexistant Prince of Canada.  
**

* * *

One particularly bright ray of sunshine filtered its way through Cat's curtains and hit me square in the eyes. That's what woke me up in the morning. Cat was still asleep against me, her light snoring somewhat resembling a purring kitten. Thinking about it, I realized a lot about Cat was like a real one. Feeling groggy I groaned and used my free hand to rub my eyes before checking the time. 6:14 am.

It took me about 15 minutes of sliding to get out of Cat's grasp and replace myself with a pillow. Then I remembered it'd be a better idea to let her know I was going to go home or else she'd freak out or be sad when she got up.

"Cat, Cat, hey Cat."

"Wait Spongebob… Patrick has… tartar sauce…" She mumbled in response. I cocked an eyebrow before nudging her gently.

"I need to get home, it's morning." She made a sleepy noise and turned to pout at me, her eyes still closed. "It's still early; you don't have to get up yet." Cat frowned and I got jolted by the strange urge to lean down and kiss her. Too soon? Yeah okay, too soon. Instead I kissed her cheek. "I'll see you at school, okay?"

Her frown faded and was replaced with a smile. "Mm.. 'Kay kay." Quietly I grabbed my bag and made sure the coast was clear before sneaking out of her room. Her family seemed to be sleeping or just not home, so there was no need for me to come up with a quick lie as to why I was still in their house.

The drive home felt longer than usual, but it was alright. Or at least I didn't hate it, so that had to mean something. The sun was still rising and for a while the sky was almost the color of Cat's hair. It was kind of cool- I mean if you like that sort of thing.

Pulling into the driveway, I noticed something sticking to the front door. A folded piece of paper was taped there with my name on it.

_Jade  
I was looking for you  
You weren't picking up your phone  
I waited_

It wasn't signed, but I recognized the writing. On the off chance I was wrong, I checked my phone. There it was. 6 missed calls and 4 new messages from Beck. What the fuck did he want? I considered texting him back, but nah. Need to get ready for school, he can look for me later. He probably got into a fight with Tori and needs help or some shit. Sometimes it sucked that he still thought of us as- oh, how did he put it? _'Good friends'_.

Anyway, I ripped the note down and walked into the house. No point sneaking around, it wasn't like my parents really cared. We had some sort of don't-ask-don't-tell agreement, and with them usually being out they trusted that I was capable of being independent. One long shower later and I felt back to my old self again. Feeling hungry I slipped into my usual black tank top and ripped skinny jeans before heading into the kitchen. It was as quiet as my house always is, so there was time to wonder if there was another reason for Beck's letter. Did they break up or something? What the hell would possess him enough to make him call 6 times when he knows I'm still annoyed. Taking a sip of coffee I remembered Cat. Would it matter to me if they broke up? Do I still want that? What about last night, this morning, didn't it mean something? I shook my head and grabbed my keys to go for a drive before school. Showers and drives, they helped.

Except this time it didn't. I kept thinking about Cat anyway. Everything was reminding me of her. How she'd chit chatter away about anything and point at everything that we passed in the car. It was driving me nuts, I almost smiled for no reason. And Jade West does _not_ smile for no reason. Exasperated, I turned on the radio to distract myself. Depending on your point of view, I either had great or horrible timing. Our song, Cat and mine, had started.

_Someday I'll let you in,  
treat you right;  
drive you out of your mind._

I couldn't help but to sing along with the radio, the song made me less bitter. My pocket vibrated and was greeted with "_New Message_ - Cat" when I pulled out my phone.

_you never met a chick like me,  
burn so bright  
I'm gonna make you blind. ;)_

_you were listening to it too right? :D_

Realizing that I'd probably hit something if I kept driving around being distracted as I was, I drove to school and parked in my usual spot. Okay, so maybe I wanted to text Cat back as well. It was pretty empty but I knew people would start arriving soon, so I pulled down the car seat to lie back. That way I could text Cat without being interrupted.

_lol?  
so stop trying to walk away  
no you wont ever leave me behind_

Three seconds later I got another text.

_you always listen to that station! :P  
you'd better believe that I'm here to stay,  
cause you're the shade & I'm the sunshine. ;)_

_kk brb see you school :DDD_

The song rang through my head again and again, almost like it was stuck on repeat. Not that I really mind. There was some time before school started and I couldn't stop thinking about when we performed _'Give it up'._ Did she even like me back then? I wondered when she started to. Hell, _why _she started to. If only I had known the hidden context behind those lyrics. Now that I think about it, it was actually pretty hot. Spontaneous, ditzy, _innocent_ little Cat could be sultry when she tried. Especially when she was singing, she practically turned into a small redhead version of Christina Aguilera. I started to day dream about it but was abruptly interrupted by a loud knocking on my window and someone yelling my name.

"Jade, hey. Jade!" I glared upwards through the window and saw Beck with his face pressed against the glass. For someone that everyone thought was cool, he could really be a dork sometimes. Keeping the annoyed look on my face, I opened the car door and swung my legs out. Beck stood leaning on the door. It was still kind of early, what was he doing here? "I came here looking for you." Great, _and _he knows what I'm thinking.

"What do you want, Beck?" Blunt as usual, what else did you expect?

He frowned a bit. "I wanted to talk to you about something."

I scoffed and rolled my eyes. "What'd you do, rub Tori the wrong way? 'cause I don't give a fuck if we're '_good friends'_, I'm not helping you with that."

"No, no, that's not it." Beck looked over both shoulders before trying to lean in and whisper. "I missed you."

* * *

**A/N:  
Yup, I went there.**

**To be honest, I'm kind of torn between keeping this normal or making it more OOC and plot twisting a bit.  
But you'll find out what I do when I update it. 8D  
(Thus the script rewrite has been shoved off for another chapter-after.  
Again. I'm sorry. :c It'll be here, I'd just like to make up my mind first.)**

**Reviews are like the hugs I never get anymore.  
You don't want me to feel unliked, do you?  
Of course you don't. So you go and abuse that review button for me.**


	7. Bad Timing and Misunderstanding

**Disclaimer: No, see, I already said if I owned Victorious I'd have changed it. But on top of that I'd have died of constant nosebleeds after the changes finished. Am I dead? No. I'm sitting here writing fanfictions. Am I having a nosebleed? Maybe, maybe. Not in this one though. Yet. Maybe. I don't know what I'm talking about anymore. What are _you_ talking about.

* * *

**No fucking way. Things seemed like they were going smoothly with Tori, everything perfect. Why? And the ecstatic feeling that used to come from our break-up-make-ups, where did that go? The lack of excitement only confirmed the unusualness known as me falling for Cat.

"Jade?" Beck made a face indicating that I'd spaced out for a while.

I shook my head. "Gimme a second, let me get out of the car." I slid out and found myself face to face with Beck as soon as I shut the door. He'd moved so that to everyone else it didn't look like he was pinning me to the door, but he actually sort of was. It was part of our old routine, you know? Heated break up equals heated make up type of thing. I stood unwavering and glared up at him. "Why?"

Beck flashed one of his usual smiles, probably thinking I was still playing. "Like I said, I missed you."

He was starting to get annoying. "No, seriously. What the fuck, Beck."

"Really, I missed you." He frowned as I gave him a skeptical look. "Thought about it all night, we were good together, you know?"

He brought up a good point. We were good together. "Yeah, _were_. Past tense." So maybe I'm a bitter bitch, what about it? "And whatever, you're with Vega in your perfect little stereotype now."

"Yeah, I am. And it is perfect, it's great." Beck leaned in and invaded what was left of my personal space. God damn. If he wasn't him I'd have knocked that smile off his face by now. "But I can't help but miss something bad. Maybe keep it bad, or make it more." Then he brought me into a tight one-sided hug.

Was he really asking what I thought he was? To secretly cheat with him would ruin Tori, and I could just make him dump her or dump him myself after a while. The perfect revenge. It was something I only dreamed about for ages.

"You know I still love you, and I know you still love me. It would fix everything." The hug remained one sided as I felt Beck speak into my hair. It was true I still loved him, but I don't think like that anymore. There was someone else in that spot now. A gasp from behind him caused my eyes to open wide. I didn't even realize I had my eyes closed, when did I close my eyes?

"Cat." I whispered, half in fear and half in shock. I'm not scared of much, if anything. But there were tears in her eyes, and the look on Cat's face was almost like-

"Cat?" Beck let go enough for him to turn around. "Oh hey, Jade was just-"

Cat smiled some sort of crookedly painful smile through her tears and dropped everything before sprinting full speed into the school. In the three seconds before I shoved Beck hard enough to send him flying onto the ground, I saw confusion and disappointment on his face. I ran after Cat as fast as I could, but there were no signs to show me where she could've gone. It didn't take much for me to realize she was probably in the bathroom, I guess that's turned into the "_we're upset" _spot.

I skid to a stop outside of the girl's bathroom door. If I rushed in she'd just run out and flee again, my best bet was to slowly corner her so that she couldn't. So I opened the door slowly and suddenly dropped down on all fours just in time to see her pull up her pair of bright colored converse. Told you she would know what I'd try.

Third stall from the front, that's where she is. Cat was trying to hold her breath but I could hear when she breathed out a sob and tried to hiccup it back in. Sounds familiar, doesn't it? I can't believe we're reduced back to this. I was going to tell Beck no, really. But Cat didn't know that, and so I tried to think of a way to explain it to her as I walked towards the stall's door.

The moment I opened the door, Cat started babbling and sobbing at the same time. She was almost hysterical. "Congratulations on getting back together with B-Beck, Jade!" Sob. Frown. Laugh. "Tori's going to be really sad, though. Maybe I should take her out for ice cream, she likes ice cream." Hiccup. Chuckle. "You and Beck should go out for ice cream together again, remember when you used to do that? I-"

It hurt to see her that way. Really, it did. So I did the only thing I could think of, I pulled her up and into a bone crushing hug. She gasped for a second before sobbing wholeheartedly into my shoulder. I knew she had to calm down first before I tried to reason with her, or else my reasoning wouldn't make any sense. She needed to let it all out. We stood there for a little bit, Cat just bawling her eyes out as I pet her hair and tried to calm her with comforting whispers.

The whole time I waited I thought about how I've never fallen for someone so fast or with that much sincerity. It was like she skipped on into the room and put a pair of Cat shaped glasses on me, everything was becoming about her. The stupid teenage stereotype that I constantly mocked because I didn't have it with Beck, I suddenly felt that for Cat. The answer to why was easy, it'd always been there. From the looks of it, it was the same thing for her too. It's just I was a stupid ass that tried to block her out with hot boys and other things I thought were the norm. Before I could start with the self hate, I noticed that she'd calmed down.

"Better?" I asked, pulling out of the hug enough to kiss her on the cheek. Cat looked at me and frowned. "I'm sorry you saw that, Cat. But-"

"Jade!" A furious voice behind me.

A clamped my teeth and tried to stay neutral so I wouldn't tell her to fuck off. "What do you want, Vega."

"What do _I_ want? What do _you_ want! What the hell are you playing at, Jade?" Tori stormed over and grabbed Cat out of my arms, I frowned to see Cat let go with ease. "Why do you have to go around wrecking everything for everybody?"

That hit a nerve. "Excuse me? That's rich, coming from you. Who's the one that stole my ex boyfriend, again?"

"If you want to come after me, fine. But you should know I'm sorry. You'll hate me anyway, but don't fuck up Cat too!" Tori paused to look behind at Cat who was shaking almost violently. I went to argue but Tori raised a hand to my face. "Cat's real, she cares- no, _cared_ about you. I don't know why she would, but she did. The whole way over she wouldn't shut up about you! She has nothing to do with this, leave her out of it!"

They don't even know the context or my own thoughts on this and they're assuming they do. I hate it when people do that. Tori just kept pushing more and more buttons by trying to do the '_right thing_'. "Listen Vega, I-"

"Stop." Cat interrupted us with a soft voice. I'm guessing my facial expression or the fact that I was grinding my teeth gave a hint that what I was about to say would be something I'd regret. It was probably best she'd interrupted me. "Tori, just give me a minute with Jade, I'll be right out."

"Are you sure, Cat? I mean, I-" Cat looked down and nodded her head. "Okay, scream if she does something." Tori glared my way and I returned it without hesitation. She walked out and I moved closer to Cat.

"Cat, it's not-"

"Congratulations." She said again, making me realize that she wouldn't listen to reason yet. What could I do? There was nothing left to try convincing her with. Her interrupting me meant she didn't want to hear what I had to say. It was just a horrible misunderstanding, and if she wasn't going to let me talk how else was I supposed to explain it all to her?

I stood there feeling the frustration, the pain, the karma of ignoring her feelings this entire time. It was my turn to not be heard, my turn to feel. It felt hopeless.

Cat's hand slid up my face and she leaned in for a lingering kiss. "Thank you for the memory, but you don't have to do this for me anymore." I opened my mouth to protest and she used a few fingers to shush me. "I'm going to need time." After that she let her hand go and started speed walking out of the bathroom.

"Wait!" I called after her, desperate to have her hear me out.

Cat turned around and yelled. "Jade, please!" She closed her eyes and her voice softened again. "Please… Leave me alone."

* * *

**A/N:  
Bam, things got worse.  
This felt bad. :c Maybe it's the lack of sleep or something.**

**But you know, I already have the next chapter typed up.  
****Slap up that review button enough and I'll post it up soon.  
You don't like it when things end bad like this, right?  
It's just I don't like posting two at once, feels weird.  
L****ike the times when I joke and it ends in "Too soon?" "Yes Emsies, too soon." "_Oh_.."**


	8. The Recap Begins

**Disclaimer: If I owned Victorious it wouldn't even be called Victorious. It'd be like... Cade... or... ious... That doesn't work. Okay, see, that's why I'm not allowed to own TV shows. I can't name things if my life depended on it. I named my dog Toby. They tell me that's a cat's name. Usually. He kind of looks like one though.

* * *

**At first it was aggravating to know that I could mend things with a mere explanation, if only Cat were to let me. After a while I realized from her point of view it was probably reasonable to do what she did. I stopped paying attention to time as all it did was frustrate me; minutes felt like hours, hours felt like days, days like weeks. I guess you could call it Cat withdrawal, the lingering feeling of still wanting her, still loving her. Little things- no, _everything_ reminded me of something to do with her. Like a sweet candy, an intoxicating drug that I was on until someone took it away. Nothing else can compare to it, and until I can have it again I can't concentrate on anything else. It made me more bitter to everyone else, more angry and irritable than usual because I couldn't let it show how much I missed her.

For the next… I don't know how long, actually. I'm going to guess roughly one week or so, Cat really went out of her way to avoid me. At first I went after her, looking to talk to her about it almost immediately after. But Vega made sure I wouldn't see her, usually she used herself as a block between us. One time it almost got violent because I could clearly see Cat right there and stupid Vega wouldn't let me by.

The only person who tried to reason with them was Andre, but they wouldn't have it. He merely shrugged at the end of their talks and gave me the '_Sorry, I tried_' look, which I nodded in appreciative thanks to. We wouldn't normally talk about it, but after the others ran to him with horrible rumors he asked me for my side so he wouldn't judge knowing just one side of the story. The rumors could go screw themselves and bite me, but if they bothered Cat I'd make some heads roll.

By the end of the week I'd announced I would need at most an extra week for the script rewrite due to personal issues and whatnot. Cat hung her head, Vega kept her glare steady and Andre looked at me with sympathy. He's not a bad guy, you know. Andre, I mean. I don't see why Vega won't just date him. Not that I want Beck back or anything, that's obvious enough. But I bet Andre wouldn't cheat on someone. It was then that I realized if I couldn't get Cat to listen to me, I could do it through the script. Ingenious, I know.

With my newfound motivation, I spent the entire 48 hours of the weekend working on the rewrite. No sleep or anything, not like I could even if I tried. Andre called a few times to check up on me and eventually I got him talking about how he likes Tori. He went on about it sounding like how I think about Cat, and it was weird because I still didn't want to bash his face in for talking like that. He gave me a new angle to look at Tori from and it wasn't as harsh as the one I usually saw her from. I told him about the idea of mending the script in favor of Cat and myself in return, and he sounded pretty excited about it. Andre thought it'd be a cool way to get Cat back and was shocked I even considered it. I told him if he continued talking about how unlike me it was or told anybody else about it being my own idea, I'd punch him. He stopped. Good to know some things don't change.

Around the end of week two or three, things had really begun to change. Andre told Cat and Tori about the rewrite so I punched him as I said I would. What? I didn't beat him silly, just punched him 'cause I'm true to my word. The downside is that they didn't believe it. They thought maybe I threatened him into doing it or something. Not a bad idea and not unlike me to do, but no. Trying things clean slate this time. I can't afford to risk the consequences of any other way when it comes to this. On top of all that, Beck had started to get kind of… weird.

One day, I think it was a Thursday, Beck showed up looking high. Everybody looked at me funny like they wanted to know if I drugged him or if I could diagnose what he was on. I couldn't, but I could tell he was on something strong. His hair was an untidy mess, like a giant unwashed rat was sitting on his head. He stopped taking care of himself in a general sense, and after a while it started to worry people. Yes, even me.

It turns out the reason behind it all was because Tori was just behind Cat that day, she saw and heard everything as well. So yeah, she dumped his sorry ass after I threw him on the floor to run after Cat. He's not used to being double dumped. I guess another stressor would be that I turned his character into a loser. That's right, the formerly handsome Beck was to play a crazy-obsessed stalker in our remake of _Phantom of the Opera_. I felt a little bit bad for doing that to him after I found out his grades plummeted and he wouldn't be able to charm his way into passing a couple of courses. After that he started skipping classes, and besides rehearsal nobody really saw him outside. Well, no, someone saw him outside once. But that was in the shady part of town, I'm thinking he was buying. It was sad to see what he'd started doing to himself. I'd have talked to him about it but I was pretty sure he wouldn't want to see me.

Rehearsals went pretty smoothly as expected from us students of Hollywood Arts. Cat, Tori and Beck showed up late or just on time so that I wouldn't see them, and took off immediately after practice every day. One problem we had was that during the first few days Cat had a hard time concentrating. I guess she was feeling conflicted about if what Andre told her was the truth. I hoped she would get it, but I'm thinking she didn't really want to. By then I didn't really blame her, but wished she would try. Tori stopped being hostile towards me because she started to believe Andre then, but there was still some awkward tension between us. Probably because she didn't know how to apologize without risking me bashing her face in. Our biggest issue? Cat wouldn't sing with me. She wouldn't even do the scenes where one of us sings to the other one. Tori told Andre later that Cat didn't want to because she wasn't sure about anything anymore. She didn't want it to hurt more, like how I hurt earlier about Beck.

_Flashback_

"_Cat, you have to practice." Andre tried to talk to her. All of us were scattered around the auditorium trying to rehearse a scene properly._

"_I do practice! All the time, I practice!" She pouted in response to him._

_He sighed. "Yeah, but you need to practice with other people, maybe?"_

_She put her hands on her hips like the answer was the most obvious thing ever. "I do that too! Right Tori? I practice with people all the time, I know what I'm doing!"_

_Tori looked rather torn between the two of them, I chuckled and she rolled her eyes at me. "Cat, maybe it's not so bad if you-"_

"_It'll be okay, really! Like sight reading except I've already read it before so it's not really sight reading anymore but it kind of is because I haven't practiced with other people- I mean I've practiced with other people but not you people, you people my friends people not people people." She babbled on and I had to hold back a sad smile. The incessant chatter meant she was desperate to not do these scenes with me._

_I walked in from behind the shadow where the Phantom was supposed to be stationed. "It's fine, we can try that." I didn't want to make her even more uncomfortable than before. "It doesn't really matter much since our first performance isn't being graded, so let's just do our best, yeah?" She would have to do this with me eventually, and I have enough patience to wait until then. I can prove her wrong. I reminded myself of those things so I wouldn't fall into complete hopelessness._

_Everybody in the auditorium mumbled a somewhat enthusiastic 'yeah' in response._

_End Flashback_

And now here we are, my watch beeping annoyingly in the background to let me know there's only 5 minutes left before our first performance. Cat's still in her dressing room, I know it. Only because this one time she was almost late and so I stopped by to check on her and found her doing some sort of pre-show ritual so she didn't mess up. So now I know that she always leaves just in time to start because of the ritual thing. It was kinda cute- Shut up.

Anyway, I took the back doors and walked in the shadows so nobody would see me. It'd be hard to explain what I was doing and I'm already in full costume. The Phantom's traditional suit was altered to suit the female body and meant to be seductive behind the black cloak. It was tight and low; it accentuated my curves but didn't restrict my movement. Props to the costume department, it looked great. For now I had the porcelain white mask tied to one of my belt loops so I wouldn't lose it. Besides one last errand, I was set and ready to go.

I made sure nobody was walking down the hallway before I walked into the light, maybe because I was already in character and that's something he'd do. From the inside of the cloak I used one of my gloved hands to pull out two entwined roses. It took me ages and a crap ton of roses to learn how to tangle one around the other without breaking their stems. A black rose was wound around another brighter colored one, a red velvet colored one. It swirled round and round against the red until it almost reached even height, stopping just short of the bud. I taped it to Cat's dressing room door quickly and used the shadows to get back to the stage unnoticed.

There was a minute left to spare when I ran to my place above the stage. Though I practiced excessively to make sure I wouldn't fall while jumping around the rafters, I was still thankful to check on the safety wire attached to my belt. I'd shit a brick leaping around this high without it. Shortly after I heard Cat's door open with a gasp and smirked before nodding my head at the rest of the cast.

Show time.

* * *

**A/N:  
Bwahahaha!  
And there you have it, the rewrite starts next chapter.**

**YOUR MISSION, should you choose to accept it:  
Is to review this and help it hit ... 38 (ooh random number) reviews.  
Then you unlock MY MISSION, which is to update this with the first scene.**

**If you don't I'll get my hammer and the gardening shears out-  
Oh, wait. That's for the people that owe me money, nevermind.**

**And to those of you who did review, I bought a brand new pack of Oreos.  
You can have some!**


	9. Rewrite: Prologue

********

Disclaimer: Okay, so the reason why I went MIA for a while was totally _**not **_**because I have issues, but because I went to fight that one guy in a battle to the death for Victorious. Yeah, I kind of lost. But look, I'm a ghost and Obi Wan says he can bring me back. **

* * *

Up in the shadows of the rafters is where I sat, in the corner that gave me a great view of the play but where nobody could see me. I noticed that Beck seemed kind of skittish, like he was nervous about something. It was unusual because Beck never gets nervous about these kinds of things. I mean, he's _Beck_. Trina broke my train of thought by making an '_ahem'_ noise as if to get me to begin, and so I started the narration.

In a deep, charming voice I hoped to scare the audience. It should work since everything was still pitch black and they couldn't see me anyway. "Good evening Mesdames and Messieurs. Welcome to my Opera House." A good chunk of the audience gasped in surprise. Score. "If you would be so kind as to give me a moment, there's someone I need to check up on."

The curtains rose and a very disguised Beck walked across the stage as the background moved with him. He was dressed in the eighteenth century version of a rich man's clothing and was using a cane. The costume department slapped loads of make up on him and did a decent job of turning him into an elderly man. Late sixties to early seventies, maybe?

He walked down the street until he reached the tall entrance to a large building. Beck stood for a few seconds to let the audience read the sign on the door before entering. As he walked in the lights dimmed and the Phantom's main theme briefly echoed across the auditorium.

_The Paris Opera House presents to you the Auction of 1919_

Now inside the music started to fade, and Beck took the seat farthest from everyone else. There were only three other people inside, and one noticed his presence. Tori was also made up to look like an elderly woman, around her late fifties or early sixties. She too was dressed in a rich person's clothing from the eighteenth century, and gave a curt nod at Beck when he sat down before turning her attention back to the auctioneer. That would be Sinjin; we had to put a wig on him so nobody would mix this minor auctioneer character with the not so minor character that he would play later. Next to Tori was an elderly looking Robbie who gave the impression of being oblivious to everything in general. Everybody was dressed as… '_spiffy_' as possible. My vocabulary did not like me saying that.

Sinjin banged a gavel around and started yelling. "Next we have one of the last dresses used in _Don Juan Triumphant_, I'll start the bidding at thirty francs. Do I hear thirty francs?"

Tori raised her card in the air and Sinjin smiled. "Thirty francs from Madame Moncharmin, do I hear thirty-five?" Robbie kept on staring into oblivion and Beck shook his head no. Sinjin's smile faded and he made a disappointed face. "And the dress goes to Madam Moncharmin for thirty francs, thank you Madam Moncharmin. And good evening to le Comte de Chagny. It's a pleasure to have you here, Monsieur."

Beck turned to nod at everyone briskly and the other three returned the gesture with just as little enthusiasm.

"Now, to our final item of the night! I hope you all recall the Phantom which once haunted these halls?" Sinjin sneered down in a creepy way. It was just like him to be able to pull off something that… creepy. In his left hand he held up a small pillow carrying a mysterious item covered by a cloth. "It was found deep in the heart of the Phantom's catacombs after he fled that fateful night. I bring you the genuine Phantom's mask!" Sinjin whipped off the cloth and revealed a duplicate of the mask I was wearing. The audience gasped along with Tori's fake one. "I'll start the bidding at fifty francs. Do I hear fifty francs?"

Robbie quickly raised his card and nodded. Sinjin was having a ball with this, you could see everyone was getting sort of into their characters already. Sinjin was grinning like a madman, Robbie was being a jerk and- wait, no, that's normal. Nevermind. "Fifty francs, do I hear fifty-five?"

Tori didn't even bother raising anything. She just yelled. "Seventy-five!"

"I hear seventy-five! Eighty, Monsieur Richard?" Robbie looked like he was going to bid again when a low voice rumbled from the back.

"One hundred."

"One hundred francs from le Comte de Chagny! Anybody, anybody?" Tori and Robbie shook their heads. "Going once. Twice. Sold to le Comte de Chagny for one hundred francs! Congratulations, sir!"

Everyone got up to leave and organize claiming their things, but Tori purposely moved to stand in Beck's way. Her voice was cold as ice and a deadpanned expression was plastered on her face. "Further congratulations on acquiring the mask, Raoul."

He seemed rather shocked. "You still remember me after all these years?"

"But of course, how could I forget? Although I wouldn't be surprised if you don't remember me."

"The auctioneer called you Moncharmin, but if I recall correctly you are Meg, correct?"

"Correct."

"The dancer girl, Christine's friend…"

As Beck's booming voice echoed through the lights began to dim to black. It was my cue when the stage crew started moving things, so as soon as I heard the light creaking I started talking in the dark again.

"Ah yes, I almost forgot about you. You probably don't know what's going on, do you? Well, let me tell you. This will be the story- no, _my _story, of the century. It has been retold time and time again, each time making it more distorted than the last. I should warn you, it's not light. Murder, torture, betrayal and most of all, love. I can introduce you to our true story, and it all begins like this…"

* * *

**A/N:  
… I missed you.  
And I am sorry. :c**

**I have a special request this time.  
I'm not/wasn't sure how to write the rewrite, actually.  
The plan was to do it differently but I got mixed advice  
= got confused  
+ life happened  
= stall on writing**

**Here I am, asking you if you could help me out.  
I was wondering if you could slap that review button and tell me what you thought.  
I know I ask you every time but this time's like "NO 4SRS MAN 0_0!1!1elevenshift1!"**

**I mean, I could write this differently.  
I could make it a whole separate story (though I wanted to make this like a story in the story :c) and skip it.  
Or I could keep doing this. It gets better, really.  
Your call, you just needa tell me.**


	10. Rewrite: Introduction

**Disclaimer: Oh boy, I missed writing these things. After I find the Golden… Straw in the Victorious chocolate … smoothie, dance with a bunch of neon 'vertically challenged' people, drink soda/burp in a room I'm not supposed to be in or touch, and beat out like 5 other people (and their legal guardians) who also want to own Victorious… Then, and only then, will I own Victorious or Phantom of the Opera.**

* * *

When the lights came back on the scene was set to outside the Opera House again, this time the background was following a carriage that was being driven down the street. Inside it was Andre, who was looking extremely excited about how the Opera House had a line up going past the block, and Robbie, who had the facial expression of someone feeling something between smug and impatient.

After clambering out of their carriage they made their way through the doors into the Opera House and bee lined their way to an older man. We were running out of people and this was just a really small minor role, so we made the group decision to ask Sikowitz if he could act as Mercier for one scene. Just one. Nothing big, he just had to talk and pretend to be normal for five seconds. Yeah, I know, weird asking the person that's supposed to grade you to be a part of the project, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

"Bonjour Monsieur Mercier!" Andre grinned and went to shake Sikowitz's hand enthusiastically. "Comment ca va?"

Sikowitz shook his head after letting go of Andre's hand and laughed. "Please, Monsieur Moncharmin. Your accent is most hideous; English, please." Sikowitz had a rather believable French accent going on that… none of us really knew he could do until we rehearsed.

"In that case," Robbie stepped in, "how's the business doing Mercier?"

"Blunt as usual, Richard." Sikowitz looked more annoyed than taken back by his question. It didn't last long, as he was booming with excitement next. "Business is great! I think 1870 will be our best year yet. We have yet another full house booked for tonight!"

All three men looked dressed for it as well, suited up in what was then considered 'casual' tuxedos. Besides the outfit they mostly looked the same, with the exception of Andre's hair. It was really different compared to his old hair. We had offered to let him use a wig because his hair definitely wouldn't fit in, but he refused and the next day he came back with it cut and styled for the play. When I asked him why he would do that to himself he said it was important to Tori, so it was important to him. I punched him for being a sap afterwards.

"Oh, enough with the numbers talk," Andre grinned playfully and put his arms over the shoulders of the two other men, "I want to see everything inside!" Neither of the others looked as amused.

"Hmm…" Sikowitz pondered for a moment before deciding his course of action. "I suppose our last guest is late then, I guess we'll have to go on without him for now. Very well, follow me!"

They walked through the theatre, past random stage crew members working on fake cleaning and in the background you could hear Tori, Cat and Trina pretend practicing faintly; just loud enough to make a whisper in your ears. Echoing their voices was the mini orchestra hidden in front of the stage that was playing softly on their own.

Out of nowhere Sikowitz jumped aside, and Robbie mimicked his actions. Andre however, was purposely too slow to move aside. He almost fell over after Tori ran smack into him, causing her to lose her balance. Luckily Andre caught her in time, or else she would've fell. Tori wasn't supposed to run into him that fast, and they stared at each other a little too long after he caught her, if you catch my drift. She looked a bit better than usual in the dancer's uniform dress though. Didn't hate it or anything.

Finally, Tori remembered where she was and spoke. "I'm so sorry Monsieur!"

Andre stood there with his jaw hanging out. Good thing that they went back to the script or I'd have thrown something at the two of them. The hell were they doing spacing out like that. She blinked at him a few times and then reached out to pat his face and close his mouth for him. Tori flushed when he didn't say anything and turned to walk away.

"Uh, wait! Mademoiselle, what is your name?" Andre managed a sentence.

"Oh, how rude of me!" Tori curtseyed and stayed in that slightly bowing position as she continued speaking. "I am Meg Giry, I dance here." Trina called out the name Meg from backstage to cue Tori's exit. "Sorry, I must go. It was nice meeting you Monsieur!" And then she sprinted head first backstage.

"Stunning, absolutely breathtaking…" Andre muttered, still gazing at where Tori had disappeared. Robbie cleared his throat loudly and as usual, looked annoyed.

Sikowitz chuckled. "Not only that, but Mademoiselle Giry also helps me manage the funds and people here; she is a great hand to have around. Just because I own the Opera House does not mean I take care of it myself."

They continued onwards through various areas until they reached a miniature stage. I chuckled to myself. Half a fake auditorium on a stage, it was the … funny? Not like haha, but you get it? thing we had to build. On the second stage stood Trina, who was singing mutely as if she was in the background. She was in full dress costume and make up as if it was the big night already.

"I see you've noticed another one of our prizes," Sikowitz paused to let Andre look at Robbie. He had the awkward stare for Trina that Andre had been making mere seconds ago at Tori. "This one is Carlotta."

"Carlotta? _The_ Carlotta? The one that stars in almost all of your recent shows?" Robbie asked, still gawking pathetically.

Trina paused in the middle of her speech and responded to him as if he'd also caught her eye. "One and only, Monsieur." She then curtseyed to be polite.

"Well then, if Carlotta does not mind?" Trina shrugged and shook her head no, so Sikowitz continued. "By now I don't think I need to announce that I'm going into early retirement, most of you gossips have spread it around much more than I'd like, thanks." He squinted his eyes at the visible stage crew but smiled to let them know he was kidding. "Your new managers will be Messieurs Moncharmin and Richard!" A bit of applause broke out from the stage crew as Andre and Robbie bowed happily. "I was going to introduce you to our third and final guest, but-"

"He likes making dramatic late entrances. My sincerest apologies for being tardy, gentlemen." Beck walked out of the backstage shadows and took his place with the other three. He'd styled his hair back so it seemed a little bit shorter than usual for a later scene. I wonder how much gel _that_ took.

"Aha! That is no problem, just good to have you here. Ladies and Gentlemen, our third guest is le Vicomte de Chagny!" Sikowitz proudly showed Beck off to everyone. I have to admit, Beck in a tuxedo type outfit is really kind of… awesome. Maybe I just have a thing for formal wear.

Beck laughed a hearty laugh, and it was nice even though just an act. "Please gentlemen, just Raoul is fine."

"Well now that you are all acquainted, I think it is time I take my leave." Sikowitz looked up at me and gave me that 'I did it, I did it' look that probably seemed like a dramatic stance to our audience. "Au revoir, et bon chance!" With that he grabbed a small bag of luggage in one hand, put on his hat with the other, and walked off stage while waving goodbye.

"May we return to rehearsal?" … I don't know when Sinjin got there, but he was already on stage and talking. His hair was tied back into a ponytail and though it was white he was only meant to look in his late twenties or thirties, a few years older than the rest.

"Of course, of course-" Andre started, but Robbie interrupted.

"Actually, I was hoping Carlotta could sing an aria for me. That wonderfully sweet one that Elissa sings in Act Three. If she does not mind, I mean."

Trina smiled some sort of devilish smile and tilted her head. "If you so wish me to then I do not mind, _Monsieur Manager_."

Sinjin looked peeved but tapped his stick at the piano boy in the back. A soft melody began to play, and after hearing it for a little while Trina's voice accompanied it.

_Think of me,  
think of me fondly  
when we've said  
goodbye._

The lights grew dim for a second and I saw that was my cue. I grabbed a pair of scissors and reached my gloved hand out just far enough that the audience could see it but not me. My hand pretty much shined due to how white it was, and the metallic scissors weren't dull either. It was great because my suit was black, meaning they couldn't see my arm, just a floating hand with scissors. The audience gasped in warning as they slowly realized I was going to cut the sandbag that seemed to be hovering above Trina while she sang. That was a stage trick though; it was actually a bit in front of Trina's standing spot so when she jumped back after the dust cleared it was sure not to hit her.

_When you find_

Two inches away from the string.

_that once again you long_

One inch.

_to take your heart back_

I grinned.  
Snip.

_and be-_

_**SMASH**_

A giant cloud of dust formed as cover for everyone to get into their shocked positions while Trina screeched at the top of her lungs through coughs. The dust cleared relatively fast thanks to the stage crew and their vacuum fan, but by then my hand had already disappeared out of place. The females of stage crew were screaming "The ghost! The phantom! He's here!" in the background.

Trina was stomping her way backstage when Andre blocked her path. "Mademoiselle, please! It was merely an accident. They happen, everything is fine!"

"I cannot work under these conditions, sir!" Trina huffed and looked as though she meant to slap Andre, but Robbie slid over. Trina glared at him. "Get rid of this so called Phantom, or you'll never see me again!" And then she pushed by both of them and continued to stomp out dramatically.

Robbie looked furious, rage spewing from his eyes as if it was trying to melt Andre in front of him. "What are we going to do? That's a full house tomorrow, a full house! We'll have to refund a full house, out of our own pockets!"

"Come on now, Richard…" Andre turned to talk to Tori who had reappeared. "Where did Mercier say he was going, again?"

"Around the world, Monsieur…" Tori looked down in response as Andre started to pale. "And furthermore, I have a note from the Phantom for you. It's always left for whoever organizes and deals with funds, so… that would be me right now."

Robbie whipped around and shouted at the audience. "Good lord, you're all fruits!" Andre signaled weakly for Tori to continue explaining.

"Um, well. She says 'Hello, welcome to my Opera House.', and that she expects the same as she did with Mercier to keep the peace." Tori nodded as though it was obvious.

"_Her_ Opera House? How do you know it's a her? Never mind that," Robbie paused and looked up at the ceiling where my hand used to be. "This is _our _Opera House, not yours!"

Andre ignored Robbie's fuming and continued talking to Tori as though Robbie wasn't there at all. "And what would her usual be, Mademoiselle Giry?"

"Box five remains empty and seventy-five thousand francs are left there for her per month." Tori whispered, seeming to be afraid of Robbie's outburst.

Robbie can do this thing where he makes the veins in his forehead pop out, and it comes in handy when you're working with him on things like this. "Seventy-five _thousand_ francs?"

Again ignoring Robbie, Andre asked Tori another question. "Who would be Carlotta's understudy?"

"With le Vicomte de Chagny as your new guest, seventy-five thousand francs is not much of a sacrifice. And there isn't one, but I know who could sing for you." Robbie started grumbling and muttering on about how nobody would be able to replace Carlotta because she's _the_ Carlotta, but nobody really paid attention to him and kept talking anyway. "Christine Daae, Monsieur. A personal friend of mine who sings chorus here, she's been taking lessons."

Out from behind the fake stage Cat's head popped out, and you could see she really was just a lowly chorus girl from the way she acted and how she was dressed. "I heard you say my name, Meg? Oh, good evening Messieurs."

"Elissa's aria, Act Three. I know you heard, so continue where she left off." Sinjin instructed Cat mercilessly and instructed the piano boy to play again. He played it even softer this time, and with more feeling as instructed.

_We never said our love was evergreen,  
or as unchanging as the sea.  
But if you can still remember,  
stop and think of me._

Beautiful. You could mute everything else in the world, make me blind and have the only sound I hear Cat's voice and I'd be happy. Hearing her sing after such a long time of barely hearing her talk, it was like letting a recovering alcoholic into the liquor store. I almost fell off the rafters.

_Think of all the things  
we've shared and seen,  
don't think about the way  
things might have been._

Andre scooted over to where Robbie was watching carefully and whispered loud enough for the audience. "She does have a beautiful voice, and looks as well." Robbie grumbled a 'maybe' and Tori shared a triumphant smile with Andre.

_Think of me, think of me waking,  
silent and resigned.  
Imagine me trying too hard  
to put you from my mind._

I was staring at Cat the entire time, waiting for the fourth and last verse to come. I should've cut it at three verses or so, so that her singing wouldn't be so long but… I couldn't help it. This verse was for us, from me to her. As I was hoping she got it, she looked up at me and confirmed she did with a small smile. It wasn't forgiveness, but it was acknowledgement. That's a start.

_Recall those days, look back on all those times,  
think of the things we'll never do.  
There will never be a day  
when I won't think of you._

Closing my eyes, I smiled and let her voice briefly take me away.

–_**To be Continued**_**–**

* * *

******A/N:  
ohayguise, I'm back. 8D and pretty hyped up, actually.  
There may or may not be problems with this chapter because I found myself making a lot of strange errors (?) around halfway through at 5am. … I'll fix it later.**

**And as a warning, the rewrite chapters are going to be quite long. Like this one.  
… I'm not sure if that's good or bad to you.**

**If you like (I made cupcakes for you) or dislike (I have throwing stars, you get one in your eye(s)), let me know with a review.  
*Either way, more reviews mean faster updates, yee yee.**


	11. Rewrite: The Angel's Mirror

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. Seriously, I don't even own my soul anymore. Loaned that to someone and still haven't got it back. I WANT IT BACK, MAN ;_;.**

* * *

I opened my eyes to the sound of a ruckus; it was Beck trying to push his way through a crowd of people on stage. I don't know about you, but I thought it was pretty cool how the stage crew helped us figure that one out. They volunteered to act as the audience while also unnoticeably pushing the background scenery around from behind them.

That was my cue to narrate. "And so you see, Christine's first performance went wonderfully; just as expected of her. She received a standing ovation and even ended up singing an encore."

The stage crew crowd was cheering random things and running about to block Beck from walking to the other side of the stage. Over the shouting and shoving you could hear Beck's voice booming. "Excuse me, excuse me! I request to see Mademoiselle Daae! Where is she?"

Shove, shove, push, push. The crowd didn't really clear up. However, someone did yell out a response to him. "Her dressing room, of course!"

"I am le Vicomte de Chagny, and I _demand_ that you all yield so that I may pass!" Everyone stopped and looked at Beck. You could almost see a vein popping out of his forehead. Cool. They paused and it got so quiet that you could hear a pin drop. Then they all shoved themselves against the backdrop and made a path for Beck to walk. "Thank you."

The scene changed as the crowd dissipated, and Beck strode confidently down the hall towards the largest dressing room of the female's area. It was made for the lead; you could tell because of the star symbol and 'CHRISTINE DAAE' replacing Carlotta's scratched out name on the door. The door was slightly opened; just enough for Beck to take a peek at Cat sitting on her bed and eavesdrop.

"Brava, brava, bravissima." I hissed in a light singsong voice, purposely emphasizing the s sound before going back to my regular voice. "Congratulations on tonight, little kitten." Shit, I was supposed to call her 'Little Lotte'. No big, right? A little improv wouldn't hurt anyone.

Cat blushed and smiled. "Oh, thank you. I was hoping you'd heard." She sat with her back to the door and was staring at a large mirror attached to the wall at the end of her bed. It was like she expected me to be behind it already, but I wasn't supposed to be there yet. "I was…"

"You were?" I edged her on in a curious tone, smirking even though nobody could see me. It was almost real.

"I was singing for you." Cat tilted her head down like she was embarrassed, and she did it in a way that was completely adorable. I bet hearts melted out there.

I smiled, improvising my response. "Then I have never, nor will ever, receive a finer gift." Cat looked up and straight at my spot in the rafters, where I sat with an encouraging look on my face. She looked like I'd given her the best compliment in the world, but I couldn't tell if it was her acting or if it was directed at my personalized lines. "Nevertheless, it's getting late and you should rest."

"Will you still be here after I wash up?" She was still looking me in the eye.

I kept her gaze and nodded down at her even though we both knew I'd still be here. "Today is the anniversary, if I remember correctly. I'm assuming you would like to pay your respects, but if you wish I will wait here for you to return."

"I do, so please stay. I will return swiftly!" Cat nodded and bounced off the bed before shoving open the door and running off stage.

Beck had hidden behind the other side of the door when she opened it, and if he was a second slower jumping backwards I'm sure she would've broken his nose. He walked into her dressing room and spent a few seconds checking in all the cupboards, dressers, underneath her bed, places someone could hide. He was looking for me, but I was nowhere to be found of course. After a while he gave up and walked back out into one of the side hallways, brushing past a sitting Tori and Andre who was walking towards her.

"Good evening!" Andre greeted both of them cheerily, but Beck just nodded his head before disappearing off stage.

Tori noticed Andre looked a bit upset that Beck hadn't responded, so she decided to chirp in. "One of the best, I'd say."

Andre seemed to lighten up at that, questioning her back with a simple "Oh?"

"Indeed, the Opera was a success. You've probably made your weight in francs and guaranteed a full house tomorrow as well." She smiled sadly, testing him a little.

Andre took a step closer to her and raised his arms in dramatic flair. "Ah, but it's not about the money! It's about the entertainment, everyone having a good time and enjoying themselves!" Tori looked pleased with his answer and seemed to be about to say something when he spoke again. "And yes, today was a great success thanks to two people."

"Two?" Already guessed the answer, she grinned at him and made it obvious that she was playing dumb. "I thought Christine Daae was the only star tonight."

"I suppose you could say that," he paused to think of wording so he could play her game. "But we had help with that, from someone who definitely deserves recognition for her skills and appreciation for her help." Then Andre did something that wasn't in the script, he very visibly winked at her.

Tori didn't seem taken back by it. In fact, she decided to mock him a little. "Oh? Now who could that be."

"A young dancer girl," he was still improvising, and though it wasn't in the script it still worked pretty well. "One I can't seem to take my eyes off of." Whoa, whoa, whoa. Do you know the meaning of 'too much', Andre? Tori definitely noticed that time. I mean, she can be stupid, but not _that_ stupid. "You could even say I might fancy her a little." A _little_? Ha!

Speechless Tori is something I don't see enough of, seriously. She just stood there staring at him like "Holy mother of- _what?_", and Robbie took that as his cue to come in- even though he was supposed to walk in ages ago. Guess he isn't as thick as we all thought.

"Giry!" Robbie clomped in. "Oh, my apologies Moncharmin. Am I interrupting?" I wanted to yell "yes" to see Andre's reaction, but it wouldn't be worth it to blow my cover.

"It's fine, we were just having a little chit chatter." It wasn't Tori's line, so she must've gotten a little thrown off by Andre's confusing confession- 'chit chatter', really?

"In that case, would you please tell Mademoiselle Daae that the Maestro has determined that she will play the lead, Countess in _Il Muto_ tomorrow evening? Practice begins early after breakfast."

"Of course, I will let her know immediately." She turned to look at Andre. "If you don't mind, that is?" He shook his head no and she left.

Tori's 'leaving' was more like her walking and the background changing behind her while Andre and Robbie slid backstage again. She walked through a few halls and out the back door of the Opera House. I hit the button for the smoke machine and it began to cloud the air on stage. Eventually Tori reached a figure that appeared through the fog and knelt down next to it.

It was Cat sitting in front of a set of gravestones. They were below a large tree with branches that created a dark shadow that engulfed what was left of the dimming light. "Hello Meg… I was about to leave, would you care to accompany me back?"

"Of course, Christine." Tori paused to help Cat stand up and they began to walk back to the Opera House. "I'm sorry I forgot. Has it really been ten years since…" She cut off, realizing she probably shouldn't have asked.

Cat had no feeling in the look on her face; it was actually kind of scary. She always expresses extreme amounts of feeling, so it was even creepier when her voice came out quiet and serious. "Yes, it has. It's been ten years since I've seen father, but the Angel he sent down now guides me."

"Christine, you're talking in riddles. What- er, who is this Angel you speak of?"

"She's the one who taught me to sing." Cat paused as if to wonder if she should tell Tori about what she thought. "A voice sung out to me and told me 'try again', and since then I've been guided by my Angel."

"Ah, that reminds me." Tori turned and hugged Cat tightly, disregarding what most would have called crazy. Schizophrenic, actually. "You were brilliant today, and I bring great news for you!" She let go of Cat and they entered the hallway that led to the crossroad where they would have to split up. "Maestro has picked you to be the Countess in _Il Muto_ tomorrow night! I suggest you get rest, for rehearsal starts early tomorrow after breakfast."

Cat beamed at her. "I'll be sure to sleep early then, I am already quite tired. Thank you for accompanying me and bringing me the good news!"

They said their goodbyes and Tori exited the stage while the scene followed Cat back to her dressing room. Once inside she left for a brief moment to quickly change into a pajama dress, and then proceeded to comb her hair in preparation for bed.

There was a soft noise from outside the dressing room and Cat did something that really caught my eye. Or should I say ear. Everybody seemed to be ignoring the script today, and though it was working wonders for the audience it was starting to catch me off guard. Cat was supposed to call out 'Arica?', as that's what we renamed the Phantom for this play. But instead what came out was:

"Jade?"

Again, almost fell off the rafter. You heard me, she called _my_ name. My _real_ name. And then for a split second you could see that she realized she made a mistake. That's when I knew I still had a chance, she hadn't forgotten. I could still fix things, the slip up made it clear.

Not missing a beat, Beck strut in looking like the confident bastard he's supposed to be. "I'm afraid not, mademoiselle."

"Who are you?" Good, Cat wasn't too shaken up or anything. She went straight back to script; that's what makes her a great actress.

Beck made a low belly laugh. "I am Raoul, le Vicomte de Chagny. We've met before, when you sang Elissa's aria. I suppose with all those lyrics in your head it makes it hard for you to remember people."

Trying not to look annoyed, Cat responded coolly. "No, I remember who you are. I meant who are you to be in the women's dressing area and intruding without knocking?"

"Ah, Christine, please do not be mad. Though I must say, anger can be quite attractive on you. I just could not wait any longer to see you, accompany me on a walk tonight." He tried using a different tactic, a softer voice.

"A walk this late? It's, it's… it's eight fifty-eight!" He didn't seem fazed by her response. "I have rehearsal early tomorrow, so I respectfully decline your request _Monsieur_ Raoul."

"Nonsense! I will return for you in two minutes." Beck walked out and peeked his head back inside to announce something before shutting the door. "At nine o'clock we shall take our walk, my dear!"

As soon as the door shut I spoke loudly, not caring if he was eavesdropping or if he could still hear. "Insolent fool! How dare he address you by your first name only!"

"I'm sor-" Cat started, but I interrupted her.

"What a _brave_ young suitor, basking in your glory." I mocked him, still speaking loudly but not yelling. You could hear I was angry, probably both because of jealousy and the fact that he was such a confident acting fellow.

Cat whispered softly this time, which was meant to make me calm down. "I'm sorry Jade." Again with my real name? I guess it's too late to go back now, might confuse the audience. "I tried to tell him no, I'm sure you heard…"

"Yes, yes I did…" I stopped to make an audible sigh. "Sincerest apologies for losing my temper like that. It was not your fault."

There was a very short silence, all Cat did was sit there making a sad face. So I spoke again.

"Please do not blame yourself. Again, I offer you my sincerest apologies for letting you see that inexcusable behavior." I was to act concerned, so I jumped down from the rafter and stood behind the mirror. It was so fast that the audience probably only saw my cape falling down behind me. That was good enough, though.

"It's not that, really." After sitting down on her bed again Cat turned to stare at the mirror. "I was just thinking that…" She paused like she could see me, but neither she nor the audience could yet. "If you were here, I could go with you. I could say I was going with you and tell him so, because I'd love to go with you instead."

"Time is running out before he comes back for you. Would you really, or are those merely words?"

Knowing her answer I adjusted my cape so that it covered the front of my body; in particular, my breasts. "I would really."

I touched the mask on my face to make sure it was still in its proper place and I nodded my head at the lighting technician to make the mirror turn transparent. I'm sure I looked rather strange with the cape covering most of my body, but nevertheless I offered her my free hand after one of the stage crew secretly pulled away the mirror's glass.

Cat looked hesitant, probably because the path behind me was a dim lit tunnel and you couldn't see much about me. I began singing in a low and hypnotizing voice to relax her.

_I am your Angel.  
Come to me, Angel of Music._

It was working; Cat was walking towards me and took the offered hand in her own.

_I am your Angel;  
come to me, Angel of Music…_

Then she walked through the mirror's frame and together we disappeared into the darkness.

–_**To be continued– **_

* * *

******A/N:  
Again, I warn you for errors.  
I said it earlier and I'll say it again, I don't really proof read these.  
'cause I do that thing where you know what you're thinking so you don't notice errors because you already know what's happening. If that makes any sense. Which it probably doesn't. But anyway.**

**You review (I CHECK 0_0!), and I get happy.  
Happy me means a writing me.  
Means you get to read more.  
Even if you've reviewed before, every bit helps.**


	12. Rewrite: Into the Catacombs

**Disclaimer: So I own… Two dogs, a gamecube, and- Oh, what's that? Victorious? No, that isn't on the list. Neither's Phantom of the Opera, where'd you get that crazy idea from?**

* * *

Through the dark tunnels we walked holding hands. It was lit by a small torch every few feet; just enough light to see where you were walking. At each crossroad we passed you could both see and hear Cat's fear that I would leave her to find her way back, but I wouldn't of course.

Deciding it was a good time, I broke the silence. "Somehow this reminds me of when I first saw you."

"How so?" Cat giggled in response, instantly forgetting our surrounding.

"Well, I- Oh, one second." I paused as we reached what was the beginning of a miniature lake. Attached to a pole on the water's edge was a small row boat, and after I hopped in I helped Cat step inside. She seemed to be handing me an oar I couldn't find, but what she really did was turn on the smoke machine on low so that it would look like I was rowing through foggy water. We weren't really moving much, just from one end of the stage to the other.

A few seconds into the water she asked again. "You…?"

"Ah right," I paused to take a breath and row the boat again. "I was wandering the halls of this maze, finally figuring my way around when I noticed…" I was just supposed to say her, but what the hell. "Do you promise not to laugh?"

Cat looked amused and played along. "Of course I won't!"

"Your hair." She tried to stifle a giggle, and we hit shore again. I took her to the final tunnel which lead to my chambers and mumbled loud enough for the audience to hear. "I've wanted to hold you since then, and previously I was holding your hand."

"Oh, I see!" Cat smiled at me and took my hand in hers again, which caused me to give her a wide grin. "You live down here?"

"If I wish to be with you then I must," I paused as if to gauge her reaction. There wasn't really one, so I continued. "Yes, this is where I live."

It was getting confusing. For a while I forgot that the audience was here and that we were just acting. That didn't usually happen, in fact, it never happened with Beck or anyone else. I wondered if she was just playing along because it's her role as an actress, or if she meant something by it.

I shook off the feeling when she sat down on a large bed and spoke to get my attention. "Are you not going to sit?"

Cat wrapped her arms around herself, and I took off my jacket from underneath my cape. "You're cold. Please, put this on." I sat down next to her and held out the jacket for her to wear. Somewhere in the back of my head a buzzer was going off and yelling _NOT IN SCRIPT_, but I ignored it. Again. Fuck that, Cat shivering meant she was actually cold. Stupid fog machine making things cold, it wasn't supposed to make things cold.

"Oh, thank you…" She looked grateful at my observation and yawned before going back to our real lines. "If I remember correctly, you offered to sing for me once upon a time."

"You still remember?" I gave her a shocked look.

Cat leaned her head against my shoulder and carefully I put my arm around her. "Of course I do, I wouldn't forget something you said." She tensed at her own slip up, but I squeezed her shoulder to let her know it was alright.

She yawned dramatically and I laughed. "How about a lullaby, then?" Cat nodded sleepily in response.

_Slowly, gently, night unfurls its splendor.  
Grasp it, sense it, tremulous and tender.  
Turn your face away from the garish light of day,  
turn your thoughts away from cold unfeeling light.  
And listen to the music of the night._

Cat snuggled more comfortably into my shoulder and I used my other hand to pull a blanket over the lower half of her body.

_Close your eyes and surrender to your darkest dreams,  
purge your eyes of the life you knew before.  
Close your eyes, let your spirit start to soar,  
and you'll live as you've never lived before._

And so she did close her eyes, making a contently sleepy sound as I continued.

_Softly, deftly, music shall caress you.  
Hear it, feel it, secretly possess you.  
Open up your mind,  
let your fantasies unwind  
in this darkness which you know you cannot fight;  
the darkness of the music of the night._

There was a hint of excitement as I sang, knowing she knew I was now singing these verses for her. I should have stopped by now.

_Let your mind start a journey through a strange new world,  
leave all thoughts of your life you knew before.  
Let your soul take you where you long to be!_

I paused to ready my voice. It had to be low, deep, soft and comforting.

_Only then can you belong to me._

Nobody seemed to mind, so I decided to finish the song. It was filled with promises of care and truth; I like to think that everyone else could hear it. It was real, and maybe they would pick up on it too.

_Floating, falling, sweet intoxication.  
Touch me, trust me, savor each sensation.  
Let the dream begin, let your darker side give in  
to the power of the music that I write,  
to the power of the music of the night._

I slid out of Cat's hold and tucked her in gently. She was still wearing my jacket as I went to leave. With my back to the audience I turned my head to see her as if it was for the last time before murmuring out the end of the song.

_You alone can make my song take flight.  
Help me make the music of the night._

Then the lighting tech thought it'd be a good time to fade to black to be dramatic, which I didn't mind. It gave me time to climb up into the rafter again, and the stage crew could move the scene back to Cat's dressing room.

When the lights came back on Beck was already going through most of Cat's room, searching what he thought could be potential hiding spots from him. As he left the room angrily I followed him by jumping from one rafter to another.

"Christine? Christine!" Beck shouted, bumping shoulders and not even acknowledging Andre or Tori's presence.

Andre looked confused and grabbed Beck's arm. "Have you checked her room?"

"Yes," Beck said, his voice highlighted with impatience. "She's not there."

"Not there?" Andre yelped, alarmed and overreacting. "Where could she be? She has rehearsal tomorrow!"

Tori touched Andre's shoulder softly as to get him to let go of Beck and spoke reassuringly. "I know my friend well, she's a light sleeper. I'm sure she probably heard a noise and went to check on it or find a late night snack."

"I had made plans with her!" Beck frowned in response, though Andre seemed satisfied by Tori's answer.

"Are you sure they were mutual plans?" Tori snapped. Andre frowned and she explained. "She seemed tired when I left her; I'm sure she would want rest rather than make last minute plans. Especially after today and her knowledge of tomorrow."

Beck didn't respond and walked off hastily before slamming both of the Opera House doors on his way out. He made his way to an alleyway which presumably lead to a shortcut to his home, but he wouldn't make it there tonight. Around mid-alley I jumped out of a sugar glass window, sending shattered shards flying all over him.

"Who dares pull such a stunt?" He snarled and grabbed a dagger from its sheath attached to his belt. Shards of glass dripped off him as he moved and he ran his other hand over his gelled hair to get the rest out.

I landed softly in front of him, chuckling and twirling a thin, medium sized sword around in my right hand. It was night and quite dark, so no worry about him seeing my identity. My laughter provoked him into yelling another question at me. "Do you know who I am? I am in no mood to be merciful if you are a thief, leave before I send you to Hell!"

Before he could react with the dagger I threw the sword into the wall near him, barely slicing his cheek. Not really, of course. It was actually dull on both sides and the bloody cut on his face was just another stage trick. "This is my warning to you. Do not harass Mademoiselle Daae more than you already have." With that, I pretend kicked him across the side of the head and into the wall where he fell unconscious.

I proceeded to walk back into the Opera House and down a shortcut to the catacombs to check on Cat. She was still sleeping, so I made my way to another room that looked to be very well soundproofed for someone with limited inventory. There was a window that you could see the through to the outside world, and right now the view was cobalt blue-black with bright stars powdering the sky.

Sitting down at a large piano, I began to flip back and forth between pretend writing and playing random bits from _Don Juan Triumphant._ There was no dialogue as I did so, so what stood out most was the changing sky in the window. It was rapidly getting lighter and lighter until the sun seemed to rise and shine through to hit my eyes.

"Gah." I groaned in reaction and put a hand up to block the bright sunshine. "Almost sunrise already? I should-" I turned to get up and go to the other room to check on Cat, but she was already standing in the doorway of this one. "Christine."

"I'm sorry, am I interrupting?" She put her hands in the pocket of my jacket and looked like she felt guilty.

I decided to tease her with my own words again. "Somewhat. Yes because I should still be writing. This is my life's work, did you know?" I tapped the manuscript in front of me and Cat hung her head. "But for you, I have all the time in the world." We shared a smile, but hers quickly faded.

"Oh, I'm wearing your jacket! Here, you should-" She walked over and started taking off the jacket.

I stood up and interrupted her by putting my hands on her shoulders. "No, keep it for now. I must go get something, have my jacket to keep you company. Feel free to explore, but please do not get lost." Frowning, I let go of her and realized she might want to leave. "That is, if you don't mind staying."

"I would like to stay, really." She reassured me, gently placing a hand on my arm.

I smiled down at her. "Very well, I won't take long then."

After taking a different tunnel path that would lead to the kitchen, I made sure nobody was awake. There were no footsteps to signify that anybody was, and there was snoring coming from backstage so I entered the kitchen freely. Breakfast for the next day- or should I say today was already set out and ready to be prepared. As usual I took some food, but this time in double. Two fresh croissants, two baguettes, a bit of jam, some butter, a few random fruits and a bottle of wine. Cranberry juice actually, but in the bottle or a glass it looked about right. I packed them away into a little velvet sack and gently placed it over my shoulder so I could carry it properly as I walked about.

The hallway outside was empty, something great about being awake in the early hours of the morning. Nobody else would bother you. Though I muttered about how it would be nice to share with someone else for once. There was a loud creak that I recognized to be the leading female's dressing room, so acting protective like I am, I made my way over to see who was going through her things. By the time I got there the dressing room was empty, but there was once difference. There was a note on her bed. I read it out loud.

_She will play the lead Countess in Il Muto tomorrow evening.  
Practice is tomorrow after breakfast, an hour or so before noon._

Underneath the note was a large book, the script to _Il Muto_. I held it up to read for a second, which let the audience see it as well. I smiled, nodding my head at the empty door in appreciation of having friends inside the Opera House. Then loud footsteps could be heard. I quickly jumped through the mirror frame and slid the glass back into place before they entered the room.

"How could she! How _could_ she?" Trina hissed, dragging someone else in by their arm. It was an agitated looking Robbie, his hair a mess and looking like she'd just woken him. He was still in his pajamas. "Who has been training her, do you know? It's not possible, nobody can be better than me!"

"Of course, of course. I do not know who has been teaching the young chorus girl, but she definitely cannot compare to the likes of you, Carlotta." Robbie rubbed his eyes and blinked, his eyelids heavy with sleep. "Not even with all the help she's been getting."

His ass kissing didn't seem to please the diva enough though, because she continued freaking out. "What am I going to do," she paused to put a dramatic hand on her forehead. Way too overdone, but whatever. "They were supposed to beg me to come back; the show was to be a wreck without me!"

Robbie quickly took her hands and pulled her close to him as he looked deep into her eyes. "But it is! Really, it is. And do not worry, they _will_ beg for you to return, the world _will_ cheer for their star. You will be the lead in _Il Muto_ tonight; I'll make sure of it."

–_**To be Continued–**_

* * *

******A/N:  
**You reviewed, I updated.  
Was this one not as good as the others?  
Maybe, maybe. Started falling asleep mid-writing.

**Chapter 13 should be done … within 24-48 hours (should be better, too).  
But here's me challenging you again.  
60? 70? What's in between that.  
Okay, uh. Hit 65 reviews and I'll throw the next update for you.**

**I like you guys.  
But I'd like you more if you reviewed. 8D**

**P.S.  
jjthejetplane1231, high five for owning the movie. XD**


	13. Rewrite: The Phantom's Mask

**Disclaimer: Once upon a time there was a Husbamf. Husbamf was very intruiged by idea of putting characters Cat Valentine and Jade West from **_**Victorious **_**together, along with the movie/play **_**Phantom of the Opera**_**. Nevertheless, no matter how hard she tried, Husbamf could not seem to own either of these productions. The End. Moral of the story? I don't know, morals usually suck.**

* * *

The next scene opened as Cat sitting on the bed in my chambers. She was facing the audience and day dreaming out loud about 'us'.

"Why is it she wears that mask when we are alone? Does she not realize I know what's behind it," She paused and looked at the entrance that I was to appear in after my cue. Well, she did know I was readily waiting nearby. What was alarming was the next bit of improv she provided. "And that I want every bit of it? The passion of my very being ready to burst in excitement, but is instead held back because of a blasted mask she refuses to remove." What was that supposed to mea- Oh god, now I'm thinking like her.

Cat stood up and walked around, carefully touching each shining object she came across before smiling dreamily. "To see her real smile is like a new addiction every time. A glimpse of her that nobody else has ever or rarely gets to see." I smiled, knowing I felt like that about her as well.

She sat at the edge of the bed again, playing with a small ring on the bedside table near her. It was a thin-ish and looked as though it would seem like it was weaving around the person's finger. There was a pattern of stones on it that made it glimmer and shine, but the stones were not a familiar type. "The real question is, am I just a toy? This 'real' I believe to be her, is it real or am I just another play thing, another game?"

She tilted her head and looked like she was going to cry while focusing her almost tearful stare on the ring, which meant that it was my cue to walk in. I knocked the door frame and held the sack of food over my shoulder again. "May I come in? I bring gifts of food and drink with me!" Cat giggled and waved her hand to signal I could come in. I made a dramatic bow at her which received another giggle, and sat down next to her on the bed. A little too close, I admit regretfully. My bad?

"This is very pretty." Cat pointed at the ring as though she wasn't allowed to touch it. "What stone is it?"

I picked up and twirled it around a little bit, watching her eyes follow it around. "Try it on, see if it fits." I threw it up in the air so she could catch it when it fell. "I made it myself, you know." It was true, I did. I swapped the fake crappy ring with my own because, hey. I thought it'd be something nice for Cat, and I did say I'm going all out in this one. And when I go all out, I go all the fuck out. She noticed and gave me an amused smile, which played well with the audience. "It's a made from a stone I found that I experimented with. I call it a 'mood stone'."

"Does that make this a 'mood ring' then?" Cat asked playfully, looking at me seriously for a moment before going back to playing at which finger to put the ring on.

Trying to sound nonchalant, I responded again. "I suppose it does, yes." My eyebrows raised a twinge as she slipped it onto the fourth finger of her left hand, and smiled sweetly. Why does that- left hand, fourth fing- Ring finger? Her ring fing- real ring finger. Ring finger.

Cat giggled at my sudden inability to speak, which probably seemed like it was all part of the play to everyone else. "Annnnd, why do you call it the 'mood' type of stone or in this case, ring?"

She had to throw in another line to buy me some time. I cleared my throat softly. "Because, well, as you can see, the stone's color changes to how you feel, in other words, your 'mood'." I paused and mumbled. "… Much better name than the 'feeling stone'." Oh. Damn. That was supposed to stay in my head.

Cat burst out laughing at my grumble and I pulled out the sack of food for two reasons. I was supposed to, and to hide my embarrassment. Thank god nobody could see I turned red behind the mask. … I'll skin you if you tell anyone about this. Though, it was a small price to pay to hear her laugh like that again.

I pulled two cups out of a drawer in the room and poured a glass of cranberry juice for both of us. Cat was already nibbling on a croissant when I placed both glasses on the bedside table. There was a small knife already out that I used to cut the baguette with, and I laid out the fruits, jam and butter in two rows so she could choose whatever she liked.

"Are you not going to have any?" Cat questioned, looking up from behind her eyelashes at me while playing with her food.

Shaking my head, I made it seem like it was no big deal. "No, I don't eat much, really. Or if I do it's at odd hours. I know it's not good for me, but I lose track of time easily."

"I bet the mask makes it troublesome." She mumbled.

"Pardon me?"

She put what was left of the croissant down and started picking out some grapes to eat. "The mask, I mean… I know you, why must you wear it when we're alone? It must make things awfully difficult."

I frowned slightly, was this part of her trying to say something or what? Best to go back to script anyway. "Perhaps, but I've grown accustomed to it."

"Wouldn't you take it off," Cat took one of the glasses off the table very delicately. It was real glass; don't want to break that stuff. "Just for a little while?"

Sounding slightly annoyed, I had an irritated yet strict tone when answering. "No, and it would be in your best interest if you follow this rule. Do not ever, ever take off my mask or remove my cape. If you abide by that, we can continue to get along charmingly. Do you understand?"

Cat nodded her head sadly and took a long sip of cranberry juice. She hiccupped for a second and I realized something was wrong. "Do you… not like the wine? I wasn't sure if you would." I threw in randomly, wondering why she hiccupped. Hiccupping could only mean one of three things, and I was sure it wasn't because she was crying.

She was turning red. Why was she turning red? "No, no. I love the wine, thank you. It's very thoughtful of you to bring me breakfast, so I thank you again." Cat played along well. "I'm just not used to something so strong." A nervous chuckle, and then another hiccup.

So strong? That was my hint, but what did she mean so strong? Wait- No, no fucking way. I leaned over, grabbed the remaining glass and took a sip. If I was anyone else I probably would've choked, because it was real wine. Why the hell was this real wine? More importantly, who the fuck replaced the cranberry juice with real wine? Shit, Cat's a lightweight. No, that's an understatement; if she drank anymore than she just did she'd probably be slurring and falling over for the rest of the show.

Trying to give her a break, I sped up the scene a little by skipping our awkward silent bit and summarizing the _Il Muto_ talk. "It is no problem, my pleasure to be able to dine with you. But I heard that you will be playing the lead in _Il Muto_, and we must practice before tonight's show. Ah, that's what I forgot. Would you please excuse me once more?"

"But why?" Her voice came out whinier than it was supposed to, and she looked somewhere between confused and horrified at herself. Yup, she definitely needed 5 minutes. Alcohol always went straight to her head.

"Because as much as I'd love to sit with you all day and talk, you need to practice in something other than your sleeping gown." I grinned at my teasing her and had to move my hand to support her because she started swaying a little.

"Of course, of course…" Cat's voice sounded distant, and so I used that to my advantage.

"Feel free to take a nap while I'm gone, you may need the rest." I lay her down on the bed and placed a blanket over her before hurrying off to the next scene so Cat could get out of there already.

I climbed up to the rafters and we were back to the fake stage again. Trina was freaking out about something or another.

"Please! I cannot concentrate when such an obviously untalented-"

"Obviously untalented?" Tori yelled back from the other side of the stage. "I'd like to see you dance for a whole hour!"

Andre was standing in front of Tori to keep her blocked and Robbie was holding Trina back from charging at her. "Anyone can dance, only real talent can sing!"

Tori went to jump at Trina but Andre made a decent block at her, so she was left yelling over his shoulder and waving her arms about. "Then why are you on stage? Get off already! You're trying so hard only because you know Christine's better than you, everyone knows and agrees!"

"Meg!" Andre shouted, to everyone's surprise. "Please Carlotta, Prima Donna, stay on stage and perform for us. Christine still has not returned."

Trina let out a loud shriek. "Christine! Christine, Christine, Christine." She let out a dramatic sob. "You only want me because your precious angel is not here!"

Robbie stepped in and hugged Trina, causing the audience to make a disgusted look while Tori and Andre cringed. "No Madame, the world wants _you_."

"Yes, you are a great woman," Andre spoke in a monotonous tone. "The audience must have been rebounding from the loss of you that night."

Trina seemed pleased by Andre and Robbie's response, so she left happily to her dressing room with Robbie trailing her from behind. Tori on the other hand, looked really angry.

"A great woman? You called her a great woman? What in God's name is wrong wit-" Tori was cut off by Andre covering her mouth with his hand.

"Please. She is a very gullible woman, more like." Tori seemed offended that he called her gullible as well, so he hastily continued. "And I am very well trained at working with overly dramatic or irrational people, or should we say Divas."

Tori raised an eyebrow, curious now that her fury was ending. "Such as?"

"My partner, perhaps?" Andre chuckled and then looked serious. "I trust you will not tell him that, of course."

"Of course." Tori said, smiling deviously. Whether in a joking manner or not was yet to be seen.

Before anyone else could say something, Robbie stormed back in. "Giry! You're being let go."

"What?" The other two yelped, one looking concerned and the other quite angry.

Robbie walked dangerously close to Tori and Andre had to put an arm between them just in case to prevent any trouble. "You heard me, pack your things and leave the Opera House at once."

"Richard, what is this about? As your partner I demand to know and have a say in this!" Andre erupted, annoyed that he wasn't consulted on this and it was a random act. And maybe because he likes the Giry girl, yeah, that probably had a little to do with it.

"Carlotta brought up good facts in our conversation. Mademoiselle Giry is the only one who manages the funds, and she is the one who leaves the seventy-five thousand for the so-called 'Phantom', but nobody has really seen whoever it is!" Robbie glared down at Tori. "It must be a scam run by her!"

"Where did you come up with this- _When_ did you come up with this, you've been spending too much time with that-" Andre started to show his anger, and this time Tori pulled him away.

When they were a little out of hearing range she whispered loud enough for the audience to hear. "Please do not argue with him for my sake. I do not want any trouble from this, especially not if it means you could end your partnership."

"Who needs a partner like_ him_." Andre spat loud enough for Robbie to glare back at him.

"Please Andre," Ooh, using his first name instead of Moncharmin, eh? I couldn't tell if she slipped up or if she was just being personal with him, because Monsieur Moncharmin's full name was actually Andre Moncharmin. "You said you're good at dealing with divas, so deal with him." She paused and spoke loud enough for Robbie to hear. "I will go."

"No, please. At the very least I offer you housing in this Opera House until further notice." Robbie looked as though he was going to object, but Andre kept talking. "Half of the Opera House is still mine, and this is my half of the decision, it is not to be discussed."

After that they split up, Andre and Tori going to her dressing room to… I don't know. Talk? Or something. I just thought they ought to leave together. Robbie went back from the way he came, straight back to Trina's room. There's another one of my cues.

I flew down from the rafter loudly. "Fire her? How dare they! She was only doing what I asked of respectfully and keeping the peace. Havoc shall reign if they continue to disobey. Just you wait and see."

Knowing nobody would be in the hall after this dispute I walked into Cat's room and picked out her favorite dress. Yes, seriously. I know which costume dress she likes wearing the most because she babbled on to my unwilling ears about it the first time we did a show together. It would fit Trina as well, and it looked perfect for the Countess role of _Il Muto_. Not that it mattered; nobody in the audience would really know much about _Il Muto_ anyway.

Sliding the mirror open again, I went back to my underground lair to check on Cat. She was still sleeping away on the bed, but this time she turned to her side so that she faced the audience. That's alright, this scene could be tweaked a little bit so I didn't have to wake her. It also meant I could say more without her hearing me.

"Such beauty…" I sat down on the edge of the bed, around in front of one of her hands. The other was tucked away under a pillow, hugging it as though she needed to be hugging something. "How I long to claim it as my own. Could it be me one day that you hold to sleep instead of that cushion?"

I decided to continue in my own words, safely knowing she was asleep. I had to make it sound like the Phantom's thoughts though, which was a little twist on what I thought. Strangely enough we have a lot in similar though. "To close my eyes every night to you, and open them in the morning and wake up with you. You seem to enjoy my company now, but how would you feel when I really take off this mask?"

No response, so I went on. "It is not a game; how I feel for and about you are the most sincere I've ever felt before." I sighed. "If I leave you in between knowing what's real and not, perhaps neither of us will be as hurt in the end. Not that I ever want there to be an end… But how can you love someone like me? You won't be able to when the cape is gone, my mask removed and all is revealed. You can't, no matter how much I love you."

I was going to continue when I felt fingers entwine with mine. Fucking hell, I was wrong. Cat was awake this entire time. Fuck, fuck, triple fuck. I didn't mean to say the L word, really. She wasn't supposed to hear that, it's too soon, _way_ too soon. Maybe she wouldn't get it, right? We're just acting and- Okay, nope, she got it. She started playing with my hand and waiting for me to go to the next scene. Please let her be drunk and unable to remember I said that later.

A bit shaken up I walked into another room, the soundproof one with the piano. Cat winked at the audience to let them know she was awake before getting up and following after me. I began practicing a song from _Don Juan Triumphant _with my back to the audience; waiting and preparing myself for what was about to come. It was making me kind of nervous because I really wouldn't know when it would happen, what with the piano being loud and me facing the other way.

But then it happened.

I made a bloodcurdling… Roar, scream, yell, shout. Whatever you'd like to call it.

Cat had ripped away my mask and cape.

_**-To be continued-**_**  
**

* * *

**A/N:  
Uh oh. What's gonna happen nowww.  
Anyway, thanks for (those of you who did) reviewing and hitting the 65 mark!**

**Feeling kind of demotivated.  
Maybe that's why the chapters haven't been doin' so good.*  
OR HAVE THEY. You tell me.**

**So you go slap up that review button (maybe it likes getting slapped up, you ever stop to think about that? Maybe it puts the M in BDSMasochism and you just don't consider its feelings and personal preferences enough).**

**Your goal? 75 reviews, do ittttt.**

***I didn't edit this one at all (I am sorry 0_0).  
It's 4am, there may be 9001 problems in it right now. I'll fix it... later, when I stop being asleep.**


	14. Rewrite: Notes and Letters

**Disclaimer: I'm running out of things to put up here. Maybe you just don't get it. Maybe you suck at English like I do. I'll put it in math then.  
Husbamf + writing The Jade Phantom =/= Husbamf*ownership(**_**Victorious + Phantom of the Opera**_**)**

* * *

A light clatter noise was heard as Cat's hands dropped both the mask and cape on the floor. Her hands were positioned as though she thought she was still holding them close to her front.

I stood in slow motion and bowed my head, turning so I was only half facing her and the audience. Like that you could see my real outfit, the slim fitting suit. For the most part it was like a ladies' tuxedo or suit minus the tie. The difference being that the shirt underneath was cut dangerously low, and instead of black and white the colors were black and red. My gloves were white to match the mask, my shoes and dress pants a polished black.

"I give you _one _rule. Just one." It was quiet, soft and calm. Fists clenched, the next words boomed out of my mouth in seething agony. "And you _break_ it? _This_ is what you wanted to see?"

When I raised my head to look at her I think the only way to describe it would be… almost homicidal. Cat gasped and took a step backwards from me, her eyes already tearing up in preparation. She took another step backwards and bumped into a nearby table, fumbling not to fall over with it.

"Damn you!" Howling, I swiveled to glance at the audience with my murderous stare. Some of them gasped in response. "_Damn you!_" Cat made a strange noise and tried to look away; it sounded like she couldn't breathe or she was being strangled. I grabbed at her hands clasped in front of her chest and pulled her close to me, almost as close as a tight hug. In this grip she couldn't help but see my face, my body, the ponytail I'd been hiding so secretly. Tears were streaming freely down her cheeks as I continued. "You said you wouldn't! You said you understood! You… you… little… Delilah!"

We stared at each other for a little while, Cat hyperventilating until I let her go and the anger faded away. I slumped down onto the ground and sat there, one hand holding half of my face up. When she stopped hyperventilating she sat down next to me quietly, just sat there staring at me. "I thought we could be happy. I was under the wrongful delusion that I… I could have everything. In reality, this is all I am. I was going to let you go, you know… I thought you might come back on your own, and perhaps…" I trailed off, and Cat touched the hand I was using to hold my face up with. She looked sad for me as she felt a few tears drip onto her hand.

"Jade, I-"

"Christine, Christine… I am… sorry. I'm merely a freak of nature, a monster behind a mask that pretends to be your angel." I sighed when I heard no response from her. "It was wrong to think you could have loved me."

After another silence I stood and dragged her up with me. "Come, you must return. Those two fools who run my theatre will be missing you." Then I went into a drawer and pulled out a cloth. After waving in front of her face once, she fell unconscious. That would've been really fucking creepy if it was real.

I picked Cat up and carried her through the catacombs for what looked like the last time. Carefully placing her on the floor, I knocked the door beside her and left before the resident could find me. Climbing back up the wall I made my way to the rafters again, jumping about until I was above the room Andre and Robbie seemed to be having a meeting in.

The two looked like they made up, but Andre was still a bit touchy when it came to Tori. "Richard, I still don't like this new financial aid you've hired."

"Come now, Moncharmin. She's plenty pretty. Can't you fall for her next?" Robbie teased him about Tori.

"Flip off, will you?" Andre said in an annoyed tone. "You and I both know this isn't working, it has nothing to do with that. Our regulars are wondering why we have a new ticket seller, where Mademoiselle Giry is and why Carlotta is on instead of Christine. For heaven's sake, we've had to postpone _Il Muto_ until this upcoming Sunday."

I pulled a small envelope out of my pocket. The envelope was sealed with a custom red wax stamp, and I let it drop lightly onto the table between them before going back to the invisible rafter hiding spot.

Thinking I was still watching them they tried to act calm and read the letter out loud.

_Messieurs Moncharmin and Richard,_

_Monsieur Richard aside, I think we can all agree that you've let a new star rise from the ashes of a monstrosity. I'm very pleased with this, you've made a great decision. Do not let that prima donna destroy it._

_I would like you to remember that you have not paid my salary yet, and I hope this is my last reminder to you. Mercier and I had a peaceful friendship, and I'd like to keep that with you two as well. _

_I suggest you refrain from angering me, unless it's a catastrophe you want._

_Best of luck,  
The Phantom_

The moment they finished reading Beck barged in on cue. He shut the door behind him and started asking his question from in front of the door. "Have you gotten rid of that Gir-"

But he was interrupted by the door slamming open and Trina jumping in. He rubbed his nose because she nicked it when bursting in. "Where is he? Where is your favorite patron?" She shrieked, currently in a frenzy.

"What do you want, Carlotta?" Beck glared in her direction and tapped his foot impatiently.

"You fancy Christine, but that does _not_ mean you can send me things such as this!" She waved around another note with the same red wax stamp, almost hitting everybody in the face with it.

"Did you send it?" Robbie asked in disbelief at Beck, I suppose he looked a bit worried as well. All the guys know they can't compete with Beck.

"Of course not," he rolled his eyes out of character. "It's like Carlotta herself said; she is not the one I care for."

Meanwhile, Andre read the note out loud.

_The role of Countess will be returned to Christine because you will step down. It will be announced personally by you. Only her talent can fulfill the needs of the audience, not your screeching. _

_If you perform this Sunday, I promise you a great misfortune will occur – a disaster beyond your imagination._

Robbie glowered at the note before shredding it to pieces.

"Christine has returned." A voice from the doorway spoke. Everyone turned to see Tori standing there, both looking and sounding very monotonous, neutral, distant.

"Well, where is she?" Beck demanded again. Him and his demands.

"Resting in my room, she's currently sleeping. And that seal is of the Phantom's, not le Vicomte de Chagny." Beck scoffed as though it was obvious. "You see, I bring a third letter from her."

_Messieurs,_

_I bring you your last warning, an ultimatum._

_Should you decide to shrug off this warning I will have to end my peaceful streak in the Opera House.  
Do you really want to go to war with me?  
I saw you have made Carlotta start practice as the Countess._

_These are my requests:  
- You will return Box Five to me, le Vicomte de Chagny will receive his refund.  
- Box Five will not be sold again.  
- Carlotta will play as the mute pageboy while Christine plays lead Countess.  
- Meg Giry will return to her job for she knows how I like things done._

_Be warned, if you continue without meeting my demands you risk your show this Sunday, and all others afterwards._

_I advise you to comply._

_The Phantom_

There was a long silence as Andre and Robbie were thinking. Eventually Andre broke the silence. "Well then, I suppose I'll get the franc-"

But he was soon interrupted by Robbie. "Are you insane? No, that's the so called 'Phantom' that thinks we're going to pay her! For all we know Giry probably planted these and she brought the last note in herself! Think about that through your rose colored glasses for once, will you?"

"Honestly, I don't think Meg would go through all the trouble or have the heart to do this." Tori's nonchalant act seemed to brighten for a second after hearing this before going back to being uncaring. "What if it's real, we don't need a war against this Phantom on top of everything else."

Trina looked like she wanted to say something but Beck stepped in. Literally, he just stepped in front of her and started talking. "Of course it's not real!"

He was about to continue but Trina did something out of character and elbowed him aside. She was just supposed to step in front of him; I guess they started getting really into it. "That's right, and because your precious angel's so tired, she should play the mute pageboy."

"If it's unanimous," Andre looked disappointed. "Then I suppose I have no choice here. But if all goes wrong, be reminded I said we should comply." He looked up at the ceiling where the first letter fell and spoke loudly. "I would _like_ to comply, but cannot."

"In that case, I will return to my room to check on Christine." Tori nodded her head curtly and left, taking the scene with her.

When she entered her room she found Cat awake but still lying in bed. Her face was covered in a sheen of new tears, but she was no longer crying. "Is it possible for one to be this tired from crying?"

Tori had a look on her face that made it seem like her heart was breaking for Cat. "I'm sorry Christine, would you like to talk about it?" Cat shook her head no. "In that case, perhaps I should save the news for later…"

"No, no… I'm fine, please tell me. Though from the way you spoke I suppose that makes it bad news…" She ended with a sigh.

"You are not fine, and unfortunately the answer is yes; the news I bring is rather horrible." Tori paused but Cat signaled for her to continue. "They've recasted you as the pageboy and Carlotta as the Countess in _Il Muto_. Production was held off until this Sunday due to… unknown reasons, and finally I'm out of a job. Luckily enough Andre is letting me stay in my room until further notice." Hm, she was using his first name freely. I wonder why. "He's a really nice man, actually. He keeps defending me even though the rest of them think I'm running a scam and the Phantom is a hoax I've made up to cover for it."

Cat's eyebrows shot up and she yelped a little too loudly. "But the Phantom is real!" She quickly covered it up. "And um, I'm very sorry to hear about your job, as well."

"Can I safely assume that what's troubling you has to do with the Phantom, then?" Tori encouraged Cat to continue with a soft smile.

"How did you know?" Cat asked, puzzled.

Tori ignored her question. "If it has to do with her being a woman, I thought you already knew that. As you said earlier, your Angel is a she."

"I find that strange, yes. But it feels so… natural." Heh, good to know. Cat was straying from her lines again. "It should be wrong, and for a while it was in the back of my mind that I shouldn't want it. But I do. I can't help that I do."

"Then what is it, did she do something?"

Cat thought carefully for a moment and seemed perplexed by her own answer. "No, it's that… Her mask, and her emotions."

"What about them?" Tori scrunched up her face and tried to understand.

"Her emotions are strong, and sometimes they overwhelm me. When I tell her so she puts the mask on and blocks me from seeing what she feels." Again with the improv. "It's a little bit scary, and though I do trust her my insecurities make me worry until I taint the trust she's earned. It makes me put some distance, makes me unable to comfort her because I'm insecure myself. I'd love to be able to if I could, but I can't yet." Oh… I wasn't expecting that.

Tori seemed a bit shocked at the sudden truth to Cat's words, but then she answered in a way that fulfilled what the script asked for while also talking to Cat. "As we're close friends," she paused so they could share a smile together. "I hope you don't think it's too personal of me to say that… Perhaps you love her? Maybe you always have. From the way you spoke of your angel… I always thought you might have. Though, that is just my thought on it. It's not something you can answer on the spot, I know. But you should consider it, it would make sense."

There was a silence started thinking about it, and Tori announced she was going to bed. "It's been a long day, hopefully tomorrow's a better one. Would you like me to walk you back to your room?"

"No, I'll be fine." Cat tried to smile. "Good night Meg, and thank you."

"Always happy to help a friend, good night."

Tori turned off her room lights and Cat left to go back to her own room. The entire walk there she had a determined look on her face, like she was still deep in thought about whether or not she loved me- I mean the Phantom. Or do I mean me? Were they talking about me? Cat was, but what about Tori?

Cat didn't bother turning on the lights to her room, so the stage was dimly lit. She took one look at the mirror and whispered something while staring upwards at me hiding in the rafters.

"I do love you."

_**-To be continued-**_

* * *

******A/N:  
… You guys gave me more reviews than I asked for within a day.  
I was actually trying to buy myself a little bit of time LOL.  
Like I said, feeling demotivated (which means BAM, no proof reading done – I'll do it later 8D;;).**

**You reviewers helped though, really.  
A big fat THANK YOU to all of you.  
You get.. uh.. oh jeez, there's nothing around me at 5am.  
…noyoucan'thavemylaptopdogcellphone.**

**Alright, alright. NEW MISSION.  
90. Yeah, **_**big**_** number. Hit 90 reviews and you get Chapter 15.**

**P.S.  
jjthejetplane1231: … When I wrote the L word thing, the first thing I thought of joking about was saying "LESBIANS?" "No, **_**love**_**." "Oh." So XD and +awesomepoints for that. Oh yeah, sanity's overrated. Join the insanity club.**


	15. Rewrite: The Mood Ring

**Disclaimer: I can't come up with a fun disclaimer three days in a row. It's impossible- okay, maybe it's possible but I'm just not awesome enough. Hey! That's just like what I say about owning **_**Victorious**_** and **_**Phantom of the Opera**_**.**

* * *

Cat froze for a second before jumping back and turning on the lights. She paced the room back and forth, occasionally running a hand through her red hair. "But… now how do I get her attention? To capture her when she doesn't want to be caught or found, for that matter."

She fell back on to her bed dramatically and put her hands on her face. "Ohhh," she groaned into a nearby pillow. "I wouldn't be surprised if she never wants to see me again after I broke the _only_ rule there was to be with her." After a few moments she opened her eyes and stared at the mirror again. "That's it! Now, what can I use to break- Oh, gosh. That might make her angrier… I suppose I'll have to try removing the mirror from the frame… But how do I do that?"

I appeared on the other side of the mirror, but only so that the audience could see me. The cape and mask were back on, and I still looked quite angry. Standing around I frowned as she tried various methods to move the mirror away. Cat tried to pull it to the side, then she tried pushing it forward to make it fall in. No matter how hard she tried it didn't budge an inch.

Feeling frustrated she went to punch her fist through it, to which I pulled the mirror away and caught her fist in my hand. "Stop."

"Jade!" Cat looked overjoyed and pulled me into a one-sided hug. "I knew you were there."

"Just only." It was hard to not just hug her back, believe me. I had no choice but to keep to the script and remain grumbling. I kept my hands to my side and refused to reciprocate the hug. We stood in that position until it started getting awkward for both us and the audience, to which I grumbled again. "I would like to leave now."

"Please don't go, I-" Cat let go of me and her eyes darted about as she looked for something to stall me into staying. "I want to understand more about the mood ring."

With an impatient look on my face I frowned. "What more is there to know, I've already explained to you it changes color with your mood."

"But you haven't explained to me what the colors mean." She tilted her head and gave me a puppy dog look. Damn, she really knows how to use that. A third shy, a third scared, a third innocent and one hundred percent adorable.

"You should know seeing as they're _your_ emotions expressed into color." I rolled my eyes and leaned against the mirror's frame, hand tapping against the glass.

Cat lifted her hand delicately in front of me. "I think it's judging yours as well. Look, the colors are mixing." Colors? It shouldn't be plural. Indeed, the ring had swirls in it when it should only have one color.

"The deep red is for anger, that shade of blue for sadness, the purple is fear and the white is loneliness." I explained, mood lightening a little bit. Most of the stones were white, but there were blue swirls inside with dark red and purple bits weaving around.

"… That's not how I feel." She told a small lie. Nice of her to try, at least.

Raising a skeptical eyebrow at her lie I explained why I made the face at her. "The loneliness takes up most of the ring so I assume that's shared, same with the blue sadness. The anger is mine and the fear is yours. I'm assuming of me."

"Explain to me again why you're so angry?" She gave me a pleading look and I tried not to frown too hard at her. "In more detail, perhaps now that we're both… calmer."

"I am angry because you pulled off my mask and cape, but you asked for more detail." I paused to let go of the scowl on my face. The red on the ring started to grow dim before starting to glow harder. "Because I love you and I can't help it. Because now you know… I'm a freak, a freak of nature. I can't give you everything you want, everything you expect from life."

Cat was silent and took in what I said. The red and purple started to fade, this time more blue spreading in its place. I turned to go abruptly with a hurt expression when she stopped me by grabbing my hand.

"You're still my angel."

Looking a bit confused she tried to clarify by smiling a careful smile at me, to which I returned, somewhat. All I gave her in response was a small tug at the corners of my lips, which seemed to be good enough for her. The ring was at full display for the audience, a rainbow of colors moving about to cover the white.

"It's late, you should rest and I should go." She looked rather upset, but I continued talking to ease her insecurities. "I will see you again sometime, do not worry."

Cat nodded and I walked back through the mirror, sealing it shut behind me. I took a different path so I ended up at a new door that resembled a closet opening. Leaving it closed, I knocked on it twice and waited. A familiar voice greeted me. "Good evening Jade, you're awfully late."

"There was a delay as I stopped by Christine's room." I sat on the floor with my back to the door as the scene shifted so you could see Tori on the other side.

"And how did that go?" You could see the amusement on her face, since she knew how it would go already. Tori seemed to be mocking me somewhat, like she wanted to hear it come from me or something.

I frowned. "I'm not sure, really. I told her I love her, and… I'm not sure. She may have said it back before I reached the mirror, but I was too far to hear." Off the script I go again. Damn going off script was getting addicting. "Was it real or just some fantasy I've projected into making real after all this time?" I paused to reassure myself it'd be alright to ask. Yeah, you heard me, I said I needed to reassure myself. It rarely happens, get over it. "I wonder, does she really love me?"

There was a short silence as Tori thought of an answer. "I think she does. But I'm not her, so I can't say for sure. From the way she acts, the way she talks and the way she says she feels, I'd think she does. Trust her and be trustworthy. Nothing has changed between you two besides a minor misunderstanding."

"Thank you." It was all I could come up with, because that was great. Props to Tori, that fit both the Phantom and my own story there.

"There is one more thing that hasn't changed, being the managers and their opinion." Tori glared in the direction of her door and went back to our lines. "They've decided that you aren't real and that there should be war between us."

"Is that so?" I looked up, a determined expression on my face. "In that case I suppose it's time, then."

Tori grinned. "To teach them a lesson?"

"Once and for all."

_**-To be continued-**_

_****_

_**

* * *

**_

**A/N:**  
**It's short, yeah I know (****_plz no hurt mi_).**  
**Probably not as good but still very necessary. Now you get to wonder what happens next!**  
**Next chapter is when the ACTION chapters start. Awesome stuff, I think.  
Look, I'm already half way done.**

**Holy fricken fracken you guys hit my goal within the day again.  
Apologies for being a day late, but I took a day off.  
… So, hey. 110's a nice number.  
That's a good… 18 reviews to get the next chapter.**

**P.S.  
Guess what I'm going to attempt to bake for someone's birthday tomorrow.  
Red velvet cupcakes.  
AWW YEAH. 8D I'll make extra for you if you review.**


	16. Rewrite: Il Muto

**Disclaimer: I tried to buy **_**Victorious**_** and **_**Phantom of the Opera**_**with the 50 cents I have. But they said no. Am sad now :c…**

* * *

The next scene was Trina in her change room, singing happily to herself and plastering on loads of white make up to her face. This new dressing room was clearly still under poorly done renovation; the former managers had destroyed a wall separating two rooms to make one giant one to impress the diva. It worked well and put her in a chipper mood until she found another note attached to her mirror when she went to recheck up on herself.

_You will not sing tonight. You have a cold and need to rest your voice – sing and you will bring disaster upon yourself._

Taking a deep breath she did some breathing exercises while reciting 'there is no such thing as the Opera Phantom, there is no such thing as the Opera Phantom' over and over again. It took a minute or two, but as soon as she calmed down she went back to dressing herself up for the big night and the scene moved slowly to the room next door.

Beck was in his boxers and putting gel to style his hair before getting ready his tuxedo. It was all laid out on a small couch nearby him so that he could see all the clothes he had to put on and they seemed to be in order. It was very … organized, overly tidy. He was humming _Think of Me_ as he put on his clothes, carefully using his hand like it could iron out the nonexistent wrinkles. After he finished he reached into his pocket to look for his lighter and found a note.

_You will not occupy Box Five tonight._

Rage spreading over his face like a wildfire, Beck quickly found his lighter and lit the note on fire. My eyes widened when he didn't drop it and let it burn the tips of his fingers. He was supposed to drop it on the ground and stomp it out before glaring at me, but instead he just watched it until it burnt out in his hand. Beck made a hiss noise at the burn and pulled out a cigarette- He wasn't supposed to have a cigarette either, what was he doing with a real cigarette. I looked backstage and saw everyone back there stare at me with puzzled expressions, which meant Beck was pulling this off himself. Why? As soon as he lit the cigarette I figured it out. That smell was familiar, weed and something else.

Luckily none of the audience seemed alarmed by this; maybe they didn't recognize the light smell like I did. Probably not, he put it out rather quickly. The rest of the cast did, however. I used hand signals to ask them from above the stage if they'd like to call an emergency intermission, but for the most part they weren't bothered by the drug use. Me neither, actually. I was just curious if they would be. What harm could a little pot do besides make him a bit slower and hungry? Cat didn't like it, though. You could tell from the look on her face. You know that's why I quit ages ago? She caught me one day a year or two back and started crying, so I promised her I'd stop if it made her feel that bad.

Trina strut onto the stage in her large dress and the play began with some stage crew members yelling things.

"They say that this youth has set my Lady's heart aflame!" The audience looked at Cat, dressed in a young man's outfit. Trina winked at her and you could start to tell Cat's straight face was forced. This was on purpose, of course. The audience was supposed to be able to see how annoyed Cat was getting.

"His Lordship sure would die of shock!"

"His Lordship is a laughing stock!" Trina laughed out in response.

"Should he suspect her, God protect her!"

"Shame! Shame! Shame! This faithless lady's bound for Hades!"

They went through the opera as usual until after the kiss scene. Trina unexpectedly pulled Cat into a stage kiss, which I noticed she kept her eyes open for. She wasn't responding to the kiss, instead she was staring straight at me. Cat tried to push Trina away and run, but Trina grabbed her by the waist hastily before she could get away. Someone coughTrinacough got a little too into her character, if you catch my drift. Trina kissed Cat again and this time Cat winked at me with the eye not visible to the audience. What the fuck- I let some jealousy in to fuel my acting for the next bit. I guess that's what she was going for. What? I haven't kissed Cat in ages.

"Did I not say that Box Five was to be _empty_?" I roared loudly from my invisible spot in the shadow. The audience murmured fearfully in response.

Cat moved her lips as if she whispered something but she didn't really say anything at all.

Trina snapped at her. "Be silent, you little toad!"

I walked across the top ceiling part of the stage, the lighting tech making sure that all you could see was my silhouette. The audience gasped as I flung my cape over my shoulder. "A toad, you say? More like a frog." With another flick of the cape I disappeared. In reality I just fell backwards onto a used futon behind the backdrop, but nobody could see that with the lights low.

"Go on, continue!" Robbie's voice hissed out from backstage.

"Serafimo, away with this pretense! You cannot speak, but kiss me in my CRO-ACK!" Trina croaked loudly. She attempted to speak again but it came out as multiple croaks in between words. Soon she held her throat and her face turned a bright crimson as her eyes started to water. Trina turned her head and shook violently while looking backstage.

Andre leapt out onto the stage and dragged the curtains with him. "Our sincerest apologies, there will be a brief intermission. When we return Mademoiselle Christine Daae will be playing the lead Countess!"

Then the scene changed to follow Andre into what was our makeshift backstage. It was shabby and slightly dim, people were running about and there was chaos everywhere. Just as to be expected from behind the scenes of a real Opera. Through the mess you could clearly see an upset Trina bawling her eyes out into Robbie's shoulder or chest. Between croaks she sobbed sincerely, and Robbie hugged her tighter with each wail.

"What- _croak_. Am- _croak_. I- _croak_." Trina cut off and went back to sobbing instead of finishing her question; 'what am I going to do?'

Robbie had enough. He snapped his fingers and a large looking member of the stage crew appeared holding his hands behind his back. "Mammoth!" The young man strode over loudly. "Fix it." Robbie hissed, pointing towards the dressing rooms.

The background followed Mammoth as he stomped towards Cat's dressing room, but was stopped by Tori blocking his way a few meters from Cat's door. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing." She didn't look impressed by his answer and refused to budge. He moved left, she moved left. He moved right, she moved right. He moved forward, she moved forward. Finally he got annoyed. "Move Giry, before I _fix_ you too."

The scene kept moving until the stage was half split; one half was Cat humming obliviously in the other room while Tori and the stage hand argued just out of hearing range outside.

Tori's eyes widened in shock when she realized what he meant by giving Cat a fixing, and she was about to go cry for help when Mammoth hit her across the head. She yelped of course, but nobody seemed to notice with all the chaos going on backstage. She wasn't a match for him so he picked her up by her neck and easily threw her into a wall. She collided with it head first and fell unconscious, while he went back to his mission of 'fixing' Cat.

Before he could reach Cat's room door I let my gloves become visible to the audience again. In my hand I held a tightly woven rope noose that I lowered down slowly and tried to catch him in. Mammoth was apparently too dumb or blind to see what I was doing or get scared by it, so he just tried to fight off the hanging rope. After a few seconds of him swatting it I managed to tie it around his neck and start to hoist him up into the air. No worries, while he was pretend swatting at the rope he actually took the invisible security cord I let down for him and clipped it to the harness he was already wearing. Mammoth made a loud strangled noise at first, but Cat was practice singing on the other side of the door so she couldn't hear. He struggled until he was halfway up to the rafters, and then his body stilled as if the life had left him.

I helped him into the hidden part of the rafters, which probably looked like me carrying his dead body to the audience. Sharing a grin with him, I whispered. "Niiiiice." We high fived. "Ready for the next bit?" He nodded his answer.

The backdrop started moving to follow Cat as she left her dressing room and started to enter the stage. The curtains rose to reopen and introduce Cat's performance, but _Il Muto_ was cut short by a shrill cry. When the curtains opened again you could see that I had abruptly dropped Mammoth's body to hang and bounce around down from the middle of the rafters. His eyes were opened wide and bloodshot; they stared downwards angrily at the audience and cast members. The rest of his body was loosely hanging, limp and swaying about.

Everyone but Tori and Trina ran up onto the stage. Cat was standing off to the side with a hand over her mouth while Robbie and Beck raced to untie Mammoth from his noose.

In the meanwhile Andre worked on damage control. "Mesdames and Messieurs, please remain calm. We will get our _real_ financial organizer, Mademoiselle Meg Giry, to refund your tickets and we hope you return for our annual masquerade later in the month."

Robbie was in a bit of shock about the hanging and politely refused Beck's offer to help him carry Mammoth's body away. Beck was left standing in the middle of the stage, just below where Mammoth was recently hanging. He used a hand to rub the back of his neck and talked to himself for a second before heading in Cat's direction. Why was he heading in Cat's direction, and why so schizophrenic attitude? Sure, it looked … like it _could_ be part of the play, but it wasn't part of his script. He was just supposed to stand there; it was Cat's cue next.

Partially on cue and partially because I was getting suspicious of his behavior, I reached out once more to cut the line to the giant chandelier above the audience's seats. When I say giant, I mean giant. The thing was probably a couple hundred pounds. Around 50"x50"x50" or something, it took five guys to carry and… no worries, we wouldn't actually shatter it. We replaced most of the original crystals with sugar glass crystals we'd made earlier.

Cat screamed and pointed upwards at the chandelier as it swung down rapidly and towards Beck. As he went to move out of the way it was clear to both him and the audience that he wouldn't be able to. Someone from backstage was grabbing his leg.

* * *

**A/N:  
Been/going to be busy for a week. ;_;  
So this didn't come out as exciting/action-y as I wanted.  
And it's kind of short? Yeah, maybe.  
Tell me your thoughts, I can't read minds.  
That would be awesome if I could, though… I'd stop getting in trouble so much.**

**Anyway, here it is (apologies for lateness).  
Thank you for the reviews, red velvet cupcakes for all! 8D**

**TO UNLOCK CHAPTER 17: Get me to 125 reviews. \o\**

**P.S. About the mood ring.  
I know, it was a bit of a stretch that ended in hit or miss.  
Don't we get one per story?  
... then again I think I have another one planned. Oops.**


	17. Rewrite: The Truth

**Disclaimer: That Dan dude, the guy who owns Victorious now? Well, he drunkenly challenged me to a duel to the death for Victorious, but I had to turn him down. I'd have won, we all know that. Pfft, hands down. But he would've gotten blood all over my brand new tuxedo/suit. :c Dry cleaning bills are expensive.**

* * *

The curtains closed right before the chandelier could hit Beck, giving him just enough time to drop down and out of its way. Strangely enough he almost didn't make it and the chandelier was an inch off of smacking straight into him. We practiced this a million times, so why...? I shook my head. Either way we got what we were going for, the audience started to gasp and talk to others around them. This gave us enough time to set up the next scene, Cat in her old room again.

Light from outside was just starting to seep in when there was a thud noise at her door. Cat sighed before opening it casually and taking the newspaper off the door. She made some sort of squint-frown combination at the front page and opened it wide so the audience could read.

_Paris Opera House Chandelier nearly kills le Vicomte de Chagny!_

The next page she flipped to was still going on about it.

_Opera House haunted! Full House refunded! See for yourself; annual Masquerade next week!_

With a huff Cat dropped the newspaper down on her bed and went to the bedside table to pick up the mood ring. And- what? She had something else with her that I couldn't see. It made the audience '_ooh_' and '_ahh_', and she made sure to keep it out of my view. She seemed to walk up a swirling staircase to a large door that led to the roof. We'd made a prop for the set so that Cat could walk to the top and it would seem like she really was high up on a roof. It almost reached the rafters where I sat, so whatever extra thing she brought with her was about to be visible to me. Down below the floor was filled with smoke that seemed like clouds, and she sat down hugging herself near the edge.

The… Entwined roses? I ducked down until head was just barely out of the audience's view. Yeah, it was definitely the black and red roses from earlier, the ones I put on her dresser door. She sighed and looked unhappy at them, so that added more to my confusion. I suppose she noticed this, because she did something she wasn't supposed to do.

From behind her back Cat signaled to Tori to wait a minute and got up to stretch. As she did so her head popped into the rafters due to the height of the stage prop. It probably seemed like it was just part of her act, and I was about to ask her what she was doing when she kissed me quickly. It was so fast that by the time I finished my double take she was already back in her sitting position. Again with the eye not visible to the audience she winked at me. What- what. What? I scowled and smiled at the same time, hissing the word 'tease' at her.

I could see Tori stifling her laughter and I turned to glare in her direction. When she noticed my face she put her acting face on and walked on stage. There was gauze and some bandages around her head and a bit on her wrist area. Snow started to fall from the sky, and Cat sat around pretending to be oblivious until after Tori opened the roof entrance. Even then she continued fiddling around with the ring and roses, every now and then rubbing her arms in fake chill.

"Shouldn't you put on a coat?" Tori suggested, putting her hands in the pocket of her own.

Cat smiled sadly at her. "Probably, but I'd like to feel the cold right now…"

"Would you… like to talk about it?" Tori offered, sitting down next to Cat. "You know we've always been able to."

"The Phantom killed Mammoth." Cat looked down and spoke in a barely audible whisper.

A curious looked played on Tori's face. "And that bothers you?"

Cat stared back at her like she didn't really want to admit it. "Yes. Mostly because..." She paused. "I know who the Phantom is. Who the Phantom really is."

"Can I assume that the reason you're holding the rose and ring up here in the early hours of the morning is because they're from her then?"

"How did you know that the Phantom's a she?" It was Cat's turn to look confused.

Tori ignored her question and kept talking. "And that you're confused as to how to feel about the entire Mammoth incident, am I correct?"

"She murdered someone!" Cat exclaimed, standing up and looking conflicted. Kind of like an angrier version of that one night at her house. It felt like such a long time ago now.

"You know, he was going to kill you. Mammoth, that is."

Disbelieving, Cat kept arguing. "Mammoth had no problems with me, I don't see why he would. Besides his financial and anger problems, Mammoth was a good man!"

"Financial, yes." Tori scowled. "Who in the House would have more francs than that diva and her manager boyfriend? Le Vicomte de Chagny aside."

"But you, and your injuries…" Cat tried one last time, you could almost feel how much she needed to know.

"Was done by Mammoth, because I refused to move out of the path to your dressing room." Tori stood up and offered Cat a hand. "It's getting cold, and I'm wearing a coat. Shall we go back inside?"

Cat nodded quietly, her face less conflicted and more guilt filled this time. "Are we still going to act _Il Muto_?"

"I don't think so, I'm pretty sure our managers have given us the week off until after the masquerade." They walked back down and towards their rooms arm in arm. After a hallway or two Andre and Robbie appeared to be walking towards them.

"Excuse me Mademoiselle Daae, do you mind if we borrow Mademoiselle Giry privately for a moment?" Andre asked politely.

Again, Cat nodded. "Of course, of course. We were just parting, I'll be resting in my chambers should I be needed then." After curtseying she disappeared off stage.

"_We-_" Andre started and then paused to pull Robbie over from the corner where he was slowly trying to slither back offstage. "Would like to offer you your job back, Mademoiselle Giry. As soon as you feel comfortable that is, should you decide to accept? Seeing as you're unwell, and oh, I do hope you heal quickly!"

Tori smiled warmly at Andre's sincerity. "You know you can call me Meg, right Andre?" Both of them blushed, causing Robbie to roll his eyes. "And I'm as ready as I'll ever be, what would you like me to start on first?"

"This is seventy-five thousand francs." Robbie said, holding out a sac for Tori to take. "Moncharmin wants you to drop this off for the so called Phantom, but I insist that I keep guard after you leave."

"Keep guard and stay as long as you like, the Phantom will still obtain her monthly wages." Tori's smile went from warm to cold in an instant, and Robbie squinted his eyes at her.

And so they made their way to Box Five, where Tori put the small sac in a compartment underneath one of the seats. Robbie sat on the seat for a good minute or two as a clock in the background started spinning faster to show some time had passed. Eventually Andre reentered and questioned if anybody had taken the money, to which Robbie tried to show him that it was still there only to find the sac empty.

Then the- What? Okay, what the fuck do they think they're doing. I get if they want to make little changes here and there, but seriously, what the fuck do they think they're doing now. Apparently without my consent they added their own little mini scene for who knows what, because it's not going to the next bit of the script immediately. Come on, man! If this fucks with the rest of the play I'm going to beat some heads off, starting with the backstage crew. When the hell was this planned?

It was Cat's dressing room again as she was scribbling something down on a piece of paper and talking for the audience as she did so. She held the note at an angle so that eventually both the audience and myself could read her final copy. Nobody really knew, but Cat could do the most beautiful calligraphy and cursive writing.  
_  
As usual I shall be visiting my family grave this vacation.  
We must meet again._

_My sincerest apologies and hope to see you soon,  
– Catarina._

What the fucking hell is she planning? Looks like there's going to be more improv than I expected. Or wanted, but whatever. I should be able to work that into the play just fine. Kind of fifty-fifty furious-curious here.

Either way my thoughts were cut short when the scene moved to what it was supposed to, Cat leaving the dressing area as Tori walked back to her own room. Which meant they must've all gotten the okay from each other to pull that off- who knows what else they planned behind me? God damn, what else is there!

As Tori was reached her room Beck popped out of nowhere and blocked her path. "Where is Christine?"

"Her room, is she not?" Tori tried to stifle a smirk, letting everyone know she knew that Cat wouldn't really be in her room.

"No, if she was I wouldn't be asking you. Now where would she be?" Beck snapped impatiently.

Tori's next expression was a very forced face, as if she didn't want more trouble or else she'd have sent him on a wild goose chase. It was through grit teeth that she spoke. "Probably on her way to visiting her family gravesite. She does that when upset. I suggest you leave her be when she's saddened, you may not make things much better for her."

Ignoring her discouraging comment he muttered thanks and took off to go backstage. The smoke machine started up again and Cat appeared through the fog, accompanied by a few gravestones and the large tree. As soon as the scene stilled she began singing dejectedly at the gravestones, rubbing her arms for warmth as though she'd been sitting there for a while.

_You were once my one companion,  
you were all that mattered.  
You were once a friend and lover,  
then my world was shattered._

_Wishing you were somehow here again,  
wishing that you were somehow near.  
Sometimes it seems if I just dreamed  
somehow you would be here._

I gently slid down from the rafters and onto a thick limb of the large tree. There I sat silently, diligently listening to the song and the lyrics she'd changed.

_Wishing I could hear your voice again,  
knowing that I never would,  
dreaming of you helped me to do  
all that you dreamed I could._

_Passing bells and skull dead angels,  
cold and monumental.  
Sing for you the wrong companions,  
you were warm and gentle._

That was my cue, I started unbuckling the cape from my shoulders and hung it carefully off a sturdy branch. I let myself drop slowly to the ground and plucked the cape from the branch, folding it so it could hang properly over one of my bent arms. After that I began tip toeing my way over to Cat.

_Too many years fighting back tears;  
why can't the past just die?_

_Wishing you were somehow here again,  
must we really say goodbye?  
Try to forgive, teach me to live;  
give me the strength to try._

About a meter away from Cat is where I stood, waiting for her to reach the end of that particular verse patiently. Standing confidently without my cape I made a silent '_ahem_' noise to get her to stop prematurely and turn around. She stood and took a step towards me. We stood like that for a little longer than we were supposed to, mostly because I think she was tongue tied at seeing me strut around in the suit proudly rather than act bitter and homicidal like before. I requested the costume department put all this stuff I thought Cat would like into the outfit, you know? It was all for this moment, and man, it was so worth it to see that look on her face. She never _really_ saw me in costume before, most of the rehearsals were in our street clothes and when she ripped the cape and mask off I doubt she had time to… appreciate some things. Eventually I broke the silence with a self-assured and charming tone, smiling devilishly at the improv.

"Catarina's a beautiful name."

_–**To be continued–**_

**

* * *

**

**A/N:  
Apologies for the late update, and I won't hold chapters for ransom.  
This time. **

**But I had a good excuse for the late update.  
I've been in and out of the hospital, you see!  
Am I going to live? Am I going to die? Who knows.  
… Okay, I know. But it was fun joking with the nurses/other patients.  
"What's say you and me bust out of this joint? I'd buy you **_**real**_** Jell-O instead of this fake crap!"**

**Anyway, I'll try to update in a few days for you.  
Maybe during the weekend, at very latest within a week.  
It's probably going to be a romantic bit, so be ready for heart bursting or cheese.  
Nacho cheese. Hahaha_I'msolame_.**

**P.S.  
YOU SHOULD STILL REVIEW (I update faster with reviews. -nod-).  
****And no, I haven't won an award for this.  
... perhaps because I never proofread olololol.**


	18. Rewrite: All I Ask of You

**Disclaimer: I fell asleep halfway through this chapter and had a dream I owned Victorious/was in the midst of making this real. Good Hamster, that was awesome. But alas, it was just a dream. And my dreams don't come true, so looks like this will remain just a fanfiction of unrelated…ness.**

****

**

* * *

**

Cat stood up and suddenly looked rather bashful. "I'm glad you like it." I smiled encouragingly and she seemed to appreciate it. "The girls used to tease me about how foreign and weird it was until I shortened it, and after a while they decided my stage name would be better if more common. From that they gave me a list, and I thought Christine would be nice. Starting with a 'C' and all." I let out a low chuckle at her ramble.

"May I ask what you prefer I call you by?" My voice was still low and charming, and the politeness of the question made her go back to being shy. "Christine or Catarina?"

Avoiding my view she thought for a moment before continuing. "I've never really liked my name because of other people." Somewhere inside I felt myself cringe at the honest confession of her improv. Instead all I showed was a look of empathy. "I don't mind either, I think? Though strangely enough I enjoy it when you say my name, so… Um, if you were to call me Catarina when we're alone, that would be nice."

"You still wish to be alone with me?" Uncertain if she meant what I thought, I questioned her.

"We're alone now, aren't we?" An irrepressible grin grew on my face at her answer; it was like the weight of the world was off my shoulders. "But… I did want to know something. I have to hear it from you." The smile faded and I nodded my head seriously. She was going back to script, I think. "Was Mammoth really going to kill me?"

I frowned. "Well… Yes. I doubt you'll consider it a defense, but he _was_ going to kill you and he _did_ hurt Meg. You saw what he did to her."

"Did you see him do that to her?" Cat kept prying about it.

"No, but besides you nobody else was in that wing backstage." Shrugging, I continued. "But I don't think you're the one who hurt her?" I paused to clarify. "I heard a friend call out for help and so I went to see what the problem was. "

Cat tilted her head curiously. "Do you consider Meg your friend, then?"

Oh, for the love of improv. I guess in a sense Tori and I do have some sort of weird friendship, especially after this. And I'd have to get used to her if I want to keep Cat around anyway. "I suppose so, yes."

Before she could ask any more about it we were interrupted by an on cue branch snapping. I quickly put on the cape again and put my hands up to gesture that she should stay put. She looked pretty scared by the sound, especially since the fog was starting to build up and engulf us. "Catarina, please, wait for me here."

After the fog covered most of Cat the set began moving as I walked around, eventually hiding in the branches a different tree as a shadow approached. Beck stumbled out of nowhere, swatting his hands around and stomping in frustration. Without making a noise I jumped down and pretended to kick- Ow. What the fuck? Beck actually took that blow to the chest; he didn't even attempt to dodge it. He fell backwards and threw real punch at me, which I managed to dodge. Glancing around me hastily I noticed that even the rest of them didn't think this was real, they hadn't noticed Beck was actually picking a fight.

He quickly regained his stance and hissed quietly, just soft enough so only I could hear. I guess he started to notice I was panicking a little bit, and quite frankly if he kept trying to actually hit me I'd call off the show right now to find out what the fuck's his problem. "Keep going, come on." I shook my head no. He went to kick at me, so I ended up grabbing his foot and throwing him sideways. Beck caught himself from falling quite easily, but the face he made at me was… I've never seen him look like that before. "Keep the play going, or else."

I've said it a million times and I'll say it again. I'm Jade West, I don't get scared. On the rare occasion that I do, I beat the shit out of it and problem's solved. But this… whatever the 'or else' he barely whispered? I don't think I want to find out, especially not right now. So I nodded my head and he charged at me. Fucking _charged_ at me, which caused my instinctive reflex- okay, maybe I took self defense a couple of times. You think I just randomly kickass out of karate moves I think of in my head or something? I flipped him. Holy mother of god, I flipped him.

From the floor he started yelling at the ceiling. "You should have just killed me!" The audience didn't seem too fazed, at least that was something… good, I guess. The fear I saw in them was probably them thinking it was all part of the show. I'd assume they'd have run out screaming by now otherwise. "I'm better off dead, look at what I've become! What _you_'ve done to me! I'm a laughingstock, me!"

"I…" I hid back in the fog so nobody could see the sad look I had for him. "I don't want you dead. I didn't want to hurt anyone, really. It's just the way things have to be."

"You should have just killed me…" Beck whispered, which was… really creepy, actually. "You've ruined me so much already…" And then to all of our surprise, he went back to script. Or fell asleep. Or something, whatever. Maybe I concussed him- wait, no, he didn't hit his head. Either way he was supposed to be left unconscious due to our stage fight, and that whatever he was doing worked for now.

Still really alarmed by the whole thing that just happened, I made my way across the stage and back to Cat. She seemed like normal, probably not realizing the threat and authenticity of the last scene.

"Do you want to stay here?" I blurted out accidentally, actually thinking about asking the question to Cat later. She looked kind of curious at my question, but I'm not sure if she got it so I tried to fix my slip up. "At the Opera House, I meant."

Cat walked up close to me, a little too close and much more than was required of her from the script. Fuck the script, why am I still going on about that. Practically none of this was script anymore. "Why?"

"You're so cute." Slip ups out the wazoo tonight. I wasn't lying; she had this look of confusion on her face as if she didn't know what I meant out of the question. Deciding I had to clarify so it didn't seem weird, I added in a little more. "The look on your face seems so lost, but in the most adorable way." And then I put a hand on her face out of reflex- fuck no, what. Why did I do that. Hormones, you can have a field day later, like after the play's over.

Cat moved even closer, breaking what little was left of my personal bubble. To my surprise she leaned into and touched the hand on her cheek with her own. Before I had time to wonder where this was going I felt her lips gently press against mine, so I let my other hands go to roam and pull her closer as she put her hands on my shoulders. She slid off my cape for more contact and wrapped her arms tightly around me after it fell off. If I wasn't getting so engrossed with the kiss I probably would've made some sort of snappy remark about how cliché it was and all that shit. It lasted longer than it should've, but not long enough for everyone around us to get sick of watching. Pft, who would get sick of watching? Though under normal circumstances they wouldn't even be able to catch a glimpse, of course.

"That's what I've wanted, that's what I want, and that's what I'm going to continue wanting." She murmured after we both pulled away. There was a small silence before she started again. "I've always remained here, always. But not because I'm necessarily fond of staying here- erm, don't get me wrong, I quite like the company I have," Cat paused and looked at Tori who was watching carefully hidden in the sideline, which meant she understood what I was really asking. "But I've never left this place for long because I wanted to stay by your side. Somehow I knew you were always there, even when you weren't."

I quickly pulled her into an unexpected hug, which she kind of 'eep'ed to. I'm not a big fan of hugs, so I started feeling rather embarrassed from this and what I was about to say. "I promise you that when my plan is done, I'll take you anywhere you want to go. We can do anything you want to do, I'll take you everywhere. If you'd like to join me, I'll promise you that."

"What's this plan you speak of?" Cat didn't let go of the hug, and neither did I. Her voice was almost too happy, it sounded like maybe even to the point of tears.

"I've written a play, you see. And I'd like it to be performed once before we leave." It was the truth and yet it fit the show so well. "_Don Juan Triumphant_ is going to show Monsieur Richard and le Vicomte de Chagny that they were wrong, and that it's not wise to cross paths with the Phantom. After it's all over, I will fulfill my promise to you." I let her go slowly but we continued to hold on to each other lightly from close range. "I'd like that ring, the one in your pocket…" I trailed off, not sure if it was wise I continue this line of improv.

With one of her hands Cat pulled out the mood ring and held it up in front of me. "This ring?"

"Yes, that ring. You see, I'd like it to mean no less than what 'normal' people would consider…" I took it from her and slid it on to the fourth finger of her left hand, her ring finger.

"Lovers?" Cat finished for me. I nodded my head. Her smile's contagious. She just smiled up at me and I couldn't stop grinning like an idiot back at her. "Won't you ask me properly, then?" She teased.

And so to respond to her I began our duet, the one I cut out of the entire play because we both agreed it'd be too difficult, especially in our former state.

_No more talk of darkness,  
forget these wide-eyed fears.  
I'm here, nothing can harm you.  
My words will warm and calm you._

_Let me be your freedom,  
let daylight dry your tears.  
I'm here, with you, beside you.  
To guard you and to guide you._

Cat beamed and held onto one of my hands so we could dance. I wouldn't really call it a dance, we just kind of walked around and every now and then I'd twirl her. There was another surprise for me, she knew the next lines even though she was told she didn't need or have to.

_Say you'll love me every waking moment,  
turning my head with talk of summer time.  
Say you need me with you now and always,  
promise me that all you say is true.  
That's all I ask of you._

That was pretty much her only verse, unfortunately. I should've edited it so that she would have more, but I worried it would've gotten boring. Then again, I'd never get bored of her singing to me. It was just the stupid audience that might.

_Then say you'll share with me one love, one lifetime,  
let me lead you from your solitude.  
Say you need me with you here, beside you-  
Anywhere you go, let me go too.  
Really, that's all I ask of you._

_Share each day with me, each night, each morning._

Most of the audience hadn't heard us sing together before, judging from their reactions. I think I saw tears in some eyes out there. Some people are just saps- … Looking at Cat I took the thought back as I noticed her eyes were brimming after we sang the previous line together. She had to pause for a second so her voice wouldn't crack while singing her next line.

_Say you love me?_

_You know I do._ She pouted at me, and I proudly sang out one more line.

_Catarina, I love you._

__

_

* * *

_

**A/N:  
This was so filled with… sap/cheese.  
If you don't like that, I apologize (and throw copious amounts of expired mayonnaise at you).  
For those who do, I hope this filled your needs.  
That's why it was rather short, by the way. If I made it any longer you'd all throw up.**

**There's… three chapters left. Or so. About that many, I think.  
What, did you think I'm done because they're all happy now?  
Nono, there's something else coming.  
If you've been paying attention to something unusual you'll have an idea of what I mean.**

**I feel like I haven't met your standards lately.  
Is it true? Hit up those reviews and tell me.**


	19. Rewrite: White Powdered Guns

**Disclaimer: I don't think I want to get a gender swap and plastic surgery just to pretend I'm that Dan dude… Or Andrew Lloyd Webber.  
And because of that I have to say "No, I don't own Victorious." :c**

* * *

Damn him. I should be ecstatic, probably in the stupid _'I'm on a mountain yelling about how she loves me'_ type way. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy. No, fuck that. I'm so much more than happy. Happier than I want to even bother trying to explain because if you don't get what I mean already then you won't no matter how much I talk about it. It's something you experience, there aren't words for it. … As cliché as that sounds. But I'm not deliriously love struck again yet, as much as I'd like to be. There's something stopping me.

And his name is Beck. God damn, what does he have up his sleeve? Being a paranoid bastard isn't what I'm used to, but I can't help but feel a cringe in the back of my mind. I know when Beck's serious; I know when he's snapped. It's rare, and even as close as I was to him I only saw it a handful of times. Back then we fixed it, we worked through it… I don't think anybody was here for him this time. Fuck.

I'm hoping I'm wrong, really I am. It could just be an overactive imagination, right? Maybe he's just too into the character? But then again, I've seen that face. I've heard that tone of voice and… I'm not willing to risk if I'm right.

The set started moving again and as usual Cat and I went our separate ways. Noting that I had a bit of time before I was due on stage again and combining that with the fact that nobody besides Cat would really notice if I wasn't in the rafters watching for my cue, I slid backstage to find Beck's dressing room. He wasn't scheduled to be in the next scene so I supposed he'd be in the room properly getting ready and all that.

"Beck." My voice was dry and had hints of disappointment. Words were hard to form after seeing him. He was sitting facing his dresser with his back to me. Both of his hands were gripping the table so hard that his knuckles were white; his head hung low as if to hover above them. Beck just stopped doing whatever it was he was doing at the sound of my voice. He made no effort to turn and face me, as the dresser was on the wall opposite to the door. I had to do this fast, there wasn't much time. "What are you up to, what are you… doing?"

"Nothing."

He still didn't move. "Bullshit. Tell me."

A short pause before he snarled. "Mind your own motherfucking business."

"It's my business because it's my fucking play." It was just like him to hit a nerve while he was angry. Since when was I ever one to censor myself? "And if you're going to be a cryptic…" I paused to steady myself. Guess I just started. "If you're going to be cryptic about it, I'd rather not risk shit going down and call this off instead."

"You can't! You won't." Beck's snarl had gone, but there was still an edge to his voice. One I couldn't quite put my finger on. "There's too much riding on this."

Confused at what he meant, I went to ask. "What are you talking about? And I wi-"

Beck slammed the table and swiveled to turn at me. It was so uncharacteristic of him that it caught me off guard. As he stomped closer towards me I started to notice something, something chalky was on the dresser table. No way… My eyes darted upwards to stare at him and what I saw confirmed it. Beck realized it as well, probably after seeing the shocked expression I was failing to hide.

"You will _not_." I froze. He rubbed his nose, wiping the white substance off. "You're going to play along, and we're going to play a game." A million things started running through my head. If there wasn't anybody else involved I'd play along, but there were other people at stake here. But to play along would also put them at risk to whatever he's doing… His voice interrupted my thoughts. "Pay attention! You think you're the only one that can rewrite a script?_ I'm _in charge now, you mindfucking bitch! I deserve this happy ending, not you!"

I was just about to start thinking of ways to reason with him or bolt out of there when he turned to stand at an angle. He smiled devilishly at me and I froze again, cautious of what he was doing.

That's when I saw it, hidden away underneath his costume top and tucked away neatly with his bottoms were two small Walther PPKs.

* * *

**A/N:  
Apologies for this being so incredibly short/fillery.  
I'll try make the next one last longer- _that's what he said!_  
And sorry for the delay in updating.**

**But things were getting terribly… predictable, don't you think?  
Too predictable for my likes. Time to shake things up, lads.  
This would be that OOC thing, yup. Please save your tomatoes for later. **

**Because there is more to come! /shot  
Much more, if I continue with this idea (because I like this more than the expected).  
But you gotta review, or else I won't think you're alright with it and just drop this project.**

**P.S. Walther PPKs are guns. 8D  
You'll get more detail on them... eventually.**


	20. Rewrite: Kisses in Broken Glass

**Disclaimer: Greetings to you, Ladies and Gentlemen! What's that? I've been gone so long that I must most definitely own _Victorious_ and _Phantom of the Opera_ by now? Nope, still just a dream.**

* * *

There was nothing else I could do besides stand there and listen to him, really. You know, with how I value my life and all that. Though honestly speaking, he could probably empty both of those guns into me if it meant he wouldn't shoot anybody else. Yeah yeah, doesn't sound very like me. But... things were finally starting to get good, you know? Like things were starting to have meaning or some cliche bullcrap.

My self reasoning was interrupted by Beck's voice again. "Would you like to know the rules?"

"The rules?" I questioned, trying to remain nonchalant. If he wanted a rise out of me, he wasn't going to get it.

He smiled. "Yes, the rules. For our game."

"Right, our game." _Crazy..._ But it wouldn't be smart to make desperate moves now. At the very best I'd have to play along and get myself out of here before warning the others. "What're the rules?"

"_You're_ not going to tell anyone." Beck's voice was sweet, almost a sickly sing-song type. "Because if you do anything suspicious? I'll have no choice but to end things early." He splayed a hand across one of the guns and tapped his fingers across it. "And I mean, _anything_. Unless you're feeling risky...?"

I shook my head. Stay calm, stay calm. Must stay calm. It was a tear between anger, fear and worry when he asked that. Stupid ego feeding question. "What else?"

"That's it, really." I looked at him curiously. "That's all I need to make you squirm. Wanna know what I'm planning?" He giggled. Oh my god, he giggled. "I'm gonna fuck Cat up." My eyebrow twitched as I tried not to react. The more I react, the more he wins. The more I react, the more he wins. I just kept repeating it in my head. Or else I'd just jump him and we'd both be dead. "Yep. But not bad, I'm just gonna trip her up here and there. And because _you_ aren't going to say_ anything_, they're going to keep going and Cat's going to look like an idiot. Ha!" He laughed for a second.

I calmed down. "So if I don't tell anybody about what you're planning, you won't..." I made hand gestures towards the guns. "Use those?"

"Nuuuuuope. Not unless you make me. 'cause, I could end _everything_. But I won't. Just so I can see you squirm. Just so I can watch you hurt. 'cause I can do that. I can do anything. I'm Beck!" Wow. They weren't kidding when they said coke makes you feel like Superman. What an ass.

"Fine, I promise. I'll even signal that nobody should bother me. But it'll be our cue soon, let's go." Whew. Everything would be fine. He just wanted to do some stupid pranks, that's all. Guns probably weren't even loaded. We could handle that, so long as all of us kept our emotions in check. Beck would ride out his invincible high, and we'd... do something about it afterwards. Something inside me wiltered a little at the realization. I can't believe I just phrased it like that. But it's true, I've already said that it bothered me to see what things had gotten down to.

We made our way back to our waiting spots and I did as I said I would. Beck and I kept a locked gaze as I signaled to everyone that they should really leave me the hell alone, and through the corner of my eye I felt crushed at the confused look on Cat's face. It would be for the best. I gave her a sympathetic look after Beck glanced away. We'd just have to cut down on some things, that's all.

The scene had changed so that it was now Cat's room, the play had fast forwarded to when Cat was going to call me over to talk about the annual Masquerade. Beck's ramble had made us miss a few minor scenes; the stage crew pretending to be tailors suitting everybody up, advertisement and excitement on the street. A short number where Andre had asked Tori to be his dance partner. Damnit, I wanted to see that. The whole idea was that they narrarated how great the Masquerade was to be, how the city's once-a-year excitement came from this main event thrown by the Opera House.

"Jade? _Ja-ade._" The high I got from hearing Cat sing my name so longingly was soon shot down by Beck's sickly grin.

Quickly, I jumped down behind the mirror and made myself visible. I was back to being fully in costume by the time I reached there, making things a tad bit difficult to pull the glass aside. Fuck. I'm an actress, I should know how to do better than this. I took a second to steady myself and my emotions. "Yes, my love?"

She blushed slightly at the pet name, and a small smirk was my response. "Well, everyone's gone to bed and..."

"And?" I strode over and sat down on the bed next to her, delicately slipping off my cape and folding it over one arm.

"Will you be attending the Masquerade? Er, if you are not, it would be understandable." Cat spoke quickly, and you could see she seemed nervous. Haha, probably not what people thought we were going to get at. As much as I wish? No. And if we were, they definitely wouldn't be watching.

Pretending to think carefully I paused and she continued to look like she was worried she'd gone too far. "Mayhaps. It depends."

"Depends? Wh-"

I interrupted her in a tone that sent the blatant message that I wouldn't be explaining. "And you? Surely someone as beautiful as yourself has a date or dance partner for the Masquerade."

"I have had many offers," Cat teased me back, pretending to act confident. "But none were appealing. They all lacked in a... certain area." Her pause was brief and- Whoa. Don't think anybody saw that, but I think she just ran her hand up my rib cage. Whoa, whoa, whoa. "There's only one person I want an invite from, anyhow."

It took me a second to remember my lines. Good job, Cat. Mission Mind Gutter has been accomplished. "Lucky person, do I know them?"

"Mayhaps, it depends." A cheeky smile.

"Ha. Think you're funny, do you?" Oh man, we were getting a little bit too into this.

She retorted ever so quickly. "If I am, so are you." For a minute or two we kept each other's stare, but it wasn't an angry one. There was no tension, most of everyone around us seemed to also be chuckling at our bickering behavior.

After that minute or two I chuckled and she giggled before suddenly stopping as I held her hand. "So then, on a more serious note, what shall you be dressed as?"

"Is it horrible that I'm tempted to say it's a surprise?" I quirked an eyebrow. "Fine, fine. I am, um. Going to be dressed as a bride."

"A bride, you say? I demand to know for whom!" It was said with a smile, to let everyone know I was just teasing again.

Cat playfully rolled her eyes in response. "For my date, of course. Assuming I have one, that is."

Very quickly I leaned over and adjusted the mask to give her a light peck on the lips. "Then I will indeed be going, and a date you shall have." I got up to leave on cue, but Cat spoke up. Again with the improv? I thought we already fixed things. What now?

"Would it be alright if I made one more request?" I turned to look at her and she stood up as well. She was slowly taking off my mask again. "Can you not wear this...? When we're alone." A bit baffled I just nodded my head, wondering where she could be going with this. Then I noticed her head was turning slightly to the right- Oh. She wants a proper kiss. Not one to deny her, I smiled in understanding before using a hand to tilt her chin upwards and capture her lips with my own. The audience and the cast '_awww_'ed at us, and both of us smiled into the kiss before the sound of breaking glass made us jump apart. Where the fuck did that come from?

I looked around to find the cause of it, but there was no shattered glass anywhere to be seen. Both of us somewhat confused, I decided it was time I take my cue. "I should go." Grabbing my cape and mask I made it past the mirror and was going to pull it closed when I was called again.

"Wait!" Cat ran up and slid the mirror open. She gasped loudly and her hand recoiled back to her side as though the glass had burned her. It was away from the audience, but I could still see what had happened. The glass had cut her hand. It wasn't too bad, though it looked like it hurt and she'd need to fix it up a little before reappearing on stage. But how- Fuckery. Someone broke a part of the mirror. Ten bucks says we all know who. That rat mother fucking bastard. Cat inhaled sharply before continuing, blinking back tears while I bit back anger. That's my Cat, great actress. Won't let anything stop her. A strange sense of pride washed over me before I went back to being angry and worried. "How will I know to find you?"

"You won't." I peeked my head through the mirror again to press a lingering kiss to her cheek. "I'll find you. Please, be safe." I whispered the last bit in her ear before I ran back. The gloves protected my hands as I slid the glass shut and turned around to find Beck invading my personal bubble. He had an emotionless expression on his face.

"That? It's only just beginning."

* * *

**A/N:  
... Hi 8D; Long time no see. I'm sure you don't want to hear my excuses.  
BUT! Life's depressing, the first two reviews I got on the last chapter were... _ow_, amongst other things.  
I've also been working on an original story as well, that too. Distractions!**

**But anyhow, thank you to those who reviewed!  
****Seriously, most of you guys (and Uncsies) are the reason why I'm slapping a band-aid on the ouch and trucking along.**

**And you know, my usual message of "5am, unedited, no beta".  
... Kinda sucks because it's been so long that I'm not sure if I'm repeating things or not making sense.  
If I am, I'll edit it/the chapter later, sorry in advance.**

**I've already re-figured things out for this story, I think.  
****Just not sure what you think, so slap up a review and let me know.**

**If there's more/enough people who want me to continue rather than quit, I'll try make the updates regular again.**


	21. Rewrite: Masquerade

**Disclaimer: No, I still don't own either of them. But you know what? I'll combine them and change my name to Dan Lloyd Webber for you. That's good enough. Right?**

* * *

In an instant my hands were in fists, but I knew better. I'd make him pay later, right now I needed to excercise some rusty self control. So maybe he was after a bit more than harmless pranks. And yes, it's a lot better than the threat of everyone being shot. But Cat getting hurt? That was a trigger, and he's lucky the damage wasn't too bad or she didn't cry. You would've had to carry us both out in stretchers if that happened.

I shook my head at how uncomfortable I made myself and went to focus on how the scene had began. Beck smiled dreamily before slithering off to do... whatever, so I went back to my invisible area near the ceiling. Everyone was dressed in different suits or dresses, all with different custom made masks. It was quite loud, people were pretending to talk over glasses of champagne while others complimented things they liked. Through the bustling crowd came an annoyed looking Beck, hopefully just acting his part. He stomped across the stage until he reached the other side, where Andre was chattering with Robbie and Trina.

"Ah, Vicomte! How are you this fine evening?" Andre tried to greet him casually with a yell so everyone could hear. Robbie nodded hello instead and Trina waved at him.

Beck gave a quick smile to them and snapped in response. "Fine. Where is Mademoiselle Daae this night?" Trina huffed and walked away, an exhasperated looking Robbie trailing behind her.

The crowd quieted down and Andre pointed at the fake stairway we had set up near the back. Everyone's attention was on Cat and Tori, who were ever so slowly descending from the top. Okay, hold up, full stop. Mind's going blank, give me a minute to explain. Only way to describe right now? One word. _Wow_.

Ahem. Anyway. The girls had gone nuts when we told them about this scene, and so they decided to make their own dresses. We'd laughed at them when they told us, but... Damn, they did a good job. I hate to admit it, but Tori looked good. She was in some sort of vintage-like blue number to match Andre's tie. It was a shade of light blue, just the right kind of color that would compliment her, actually. Both of them had a very similar feminine mask on, though you could easily tell them apart by their blatant differences. You know. Hair color, height, body... features. I meant features. Right.

Cat looked... perfect. A perfect wedding dress for this occasion, kind of seemingly old fashioned but with a modern twist. Hard to describe, use your imagination. It was white or maybe off white, I couldn't quite tell. Either way, it was a bit flowy but just to the right amount so that it looked awesome and she could still walk around in it. It was only because I went looking that I noticed the barely visible bandage she'd put on her injured hand. My blood started to boil at the thought, so I went back to appreciating how inexplicable they looked walking down the stairs.

"If you'll excuse me." Andre nodded politely as he left and walked towards the staircase. When the girls reached the bottom the crowd lessened so that there was only a few couples left dancing on stage. Andre quietly murmured something to Tori that made her blush, and Cat beamed at her to say they should go dance. And so Andre and Tori joined the rest of the waltzing couples while Cat stood alone at the bottom of the stairs.

Beck turned his back to Cat and took out a ring box for everyone to see. Inside was a fancy cubic zirconia ring we'd loaned off of Trina from when she had some sort of wedding phase. He pat it a few times and watched from afar as random stage crew members seemed to be mutely asking Cat to dance. One by one they walked up to her and bowed, and one by one she shook her head no. Beck looked smug, as though he thought it was for him. Even though I knew he was just acting the part, I rolled my eyes.

Slowly the couples dancing on stage started to dance their way off stage and the scene moved with Beck as he walked towards Cat. "Bonjour Mademoiselle."

Cat tried to lean backwards but she was already pressed against the stairwell. In a somewhat small voice she managed to mutter something out. "Good evening, Vicomte."

"Would you be so kind as to give me your first dance?" He tried politely at first.

She shook her head and tried to avoid looking at his eyes. "I cannot, Vicomte. I've made a promise to someone else."

"I suggest you comply, Mademoiselle." Beck took a dangerous step closer and you could tell he was getting dangerously annoyed. "It would be a shame for your first dance to have to be _taken_."

"Dictum meum pactum." Cat spoke coolly. It was kinda hot when she spoke another language, even awesome..er that she was being cold to Beck with it. "My word is my bond, Vicomte. I refuse to break it for anyone, especially you."

Quickly, Beck pulled out his ring box and held it out with a confident grin. It also had traces of.. danger? in it. If you can picture that. "Not even for your fiancee?"

That was my cue. I walked on over to them in plain sight. My costume was still pretty much the same, though I'd loosened it a little so you couldn't quite tell my gender. Only my facial features and hair really gave me away, but the mask hid half my face while my hair was tied into an elegant tail. It was like a longer version of Beck's, so that wasn't too bad. For the most part it was alright seeing as beforehand half of the crowd was also dressed similarly; back then the Phantom's costume was a top seller.

Before he could slide the ring onto Cat's reluctant finger I grabbed his wrist. "Pardon me, but I believe the girl has said she's spoken for."

"And who are you?" Beck snapped in response.

"That would be my fiancee, Monsieur." Cat smiled at me and I winked over Beck's shoulder. "As I tried to explain earlier, I've promised my first dance to someone else. This would be them."

Releasing Beck's wrist I proudly held Cat's hand in my own, grinning widely at the feel of my ring on her finger. "So, if you'll excuse us." I was curt in response to him before taking the very willing Cat onto the dance floor without waiting for his answer.

The stage moved with us so Beck slid away and the dancing couples returned. There was soft music playing in the background and we joined their waltz, but they made sure to keep clear of us so we would have full attention.

"Thank you." Cat murmured, and either she was being a _really_ good actress, or she was genuinely thankful for something.

I shook my head and answered sincerely. It was hard to tell emotion with me since my mask was on due to the public. "No, thank _you_."

"But what for?" She questioned.

The waltz started to slow and I very openly tried to avoid looking at her. "Many things. Referring to me as your fiancee, actually saving your first dance..." I trailed off in insecurity before trying to straighten my voice. "As I said, many things. Unless of course, it was merely because you loathe him, which would be reasonable and not argued."

It was her turn to shake her head. "No, I really meant it. I'm for nobody else but you."

There was a few seconds as we just danced while beaming at each other before I broke the comfortable silence. Out of line and into improv, but fuck that. "You're quite stunning tonight, by the way." She looked at me curiously. "Not to say you're not stunning any other night, but particularly so this evening." I paused. "You can tell so from my accidental ramblings."

"Well, I accept your compliment then." Cat tried to step a bit closer towards me but I took a step back. The rules of this dance were to keep distance, because it wasn't proper to be close back then. That much was scheduled in the script. The next part, not so much. "But you too are very... alluring, tonight. And every other, really. I wish we didn't have to dance with such distance."

"Then perhaps, after this is all done with..." I tilted my head for dramatic pause and noticed the song was ending. "We could have a private dance? Without the distance." Cat flushed. "Well, I didn't quite mean like that, but if that's what you have in mind I'm not one to protest." My teasing caused her to turn a shade darker, matching her hair.

Before she could answer we realized the song had ended and our time was up. Beck stormed over towards us with... real anger, it seemed. Fuck. I was supposed to cool things off, not make them worse. Best case scenario it was part of the act, worst case scenario something would happen. I tried to keep my hopes up and go along with things, what else was there to do? It was part of the script and I couldn't be too suspicious about it, he'd flip out.

"Mademoiselle." Beck's voice was harsh as he practically ripped Cat away from me. Again, part of script.

Quickly the stage spun to remove me from view. Directly behind the backdrop was my secondary costume, an easy to slip on number. It was pretty much just a change of the shirt and tie, really. And a different mask, of course. In the meanwhile I tried to keep an ear on what was going on with Cat and Beck. Saying them being alone together was worrying me would be a severe understatement. Who knows what he'd try next? Even with the audience and all.

"How dare he, does that stupid commoner know who I am?" I busied myself with unbuttoning my vest. "Who was he?"

I rolled my eyes and hastily threw off the vest. Captain Obvious, this is your cue. "I've said so twice and I'll remind you thrice. My fiancee, Vicomte."

"Nonsense! Surely you jest." My tie was off, but buttons... unbuttoning fucking fancy shirt buttons. If I didn't have to change back I'd just rip this off, the stupid thing was taking forever. "There was no announcement and I heard no speech of longing."

The shirt was off and I grabbed at the one hanging on the rack next to me. "I am not an object, Vicomte. And my engagement is no joke, I'd rather that you do not refer to it as one." Cat huffed. I chuckled while buttoning up. It was cute when she huffed. "Honestly speaking, I wish you would just leave me alone!"

After the shirt was done the tie only took a few seconds. I shrugged a jacket on and checked a nearby mirror. Black pants, vest and long tie, red dress shirt and jacket. Check. Cape? Check. "What a shame, no dance with your _real_ fiancee?" There was a muffled thud as I heard Beck fall down to one knee, no doubt offering up the ring.

"I assure you, I already have a _real fiancee_," Cat started, voicing her frustration. "And even if I did not, after this stunt you would be the last person I'd consider!"

In a flash I was running to the rafters again, but in a different spot. This time I was aiming to hide at the top of the stairwell. At the top I'd already placed my temporary mask, a porcelain white skull that only showed my teeth. My eyes were blankened out but I would still be able to see, kind of a mesh-ish type thing. I don't know, ask the costume department how they did it. Right, all ready to go.

"You _will_ be _my_ bride, or so help me I-" Beck was cut short as the stage went black and the loud boom of the Phantom's theme rang out. I stepped into the light and the audience gasped along with the crew. There was a dangerous sounding music note being hit on repeat that echoed each step I took. It was some sort of low string instument? Yeah, something like that.

I was supposed to chuckle, but it came out more like a dark laugh. "Why so silent, good messieurs? Did you think that I'd left you for good?"

"The Phantom... is also Red Death?" One of the dancers murmured out before fainting.

My sparkly whites flashed in a grin. "I have written you an Opera!" A second later my smile vanished as I noticed Cat and Beck. He was standing at an odd angle, and with good reason. It was only because I had a different view that I could see what he was doing. Beck had one of the guns to Cat's back. I'm pretty sure it wasn't touching or anything, or else she would've reacted. Or maybe it did and she didn't realize it was a gun. Maybe he didn't tell her it was a gun. Maybe- Fuck this.

_**THUD**_

That's right, fucking _thud_. I threw the thick book that was to contain _Don Juan Triumphant_ at Beck. My aim's a sure shot as always, so it hit him square in the head and knocked him back. "You get away from her." One jump later I was at the bottom of the stairs, ignoring the little fire that lit up temporarily in my ankles. I turned to Cat to at least try to keep on script, but Beck was already standing up and lunging at me.

"She can't be yours! The likes of you don't deserve her! You deserve nothing!" At the last minute I moved out of the way and he fell forward. A glint from the shiny metal caught my eye, but it was carefully tucked back into his costume before anyone else could see. Good.

For comfort I held Cat's injured hand and rubbed soft circles over the bandage out of the audience's view. "Her chains are still mine, she belongs to me. The lovely Mademoiselle has made her choice, and it is not you. If anything, you are the one with nothing. Pitiful Vicomte." There was a short pause as I tested to see if Beck was still sane. Or at least lucid enough to turn my back on. Shit, I'd gone a bit too far? To fill in the gap Cat fiddled with my ring on her finger to show the audience a second meaning. When he nodded his head with that gleam in his eye like before, I turned to Andre and Robbie who held the booklet. "_Don Juan Triumphant._ It shall be performed as the next play. I advise you to comply. Remember - there are worse things than a shattered chandelier."

Then I- What? There was something off. I knew I shouldn't have believed he wouldn't try something. Beck was already standing on the trap door. I was supposed to flick my cape and have him run at me before having the cape whip around us as we fell into the trap door. You know, stage tricks so we'd disappear. But he was already there. And already near the hidden switch. "I won't let you have anything, I'll shatter her first." What the- Fucking motherfucker!

Beck was turned to aim the Walther PPKs at Cat, though he hadn't drawn them out yet. Whether it was to scare Cat, scare me, or really harm someone, I didn't care. I realized it before the others, and before anyone could react I'd already tackled him to the ground. As we both fell I pulled the switch to make us fall through the trap door, but not before a sharp hiss of air rang out and I felt something cut through my skin.

* * *

**A/N:  
I'm bringin' cliffhanger's back, chhhyeah!  
... Okay, done with the lame song moment. 8D  
You can just tell I'm doing better now LOL. **

**I apologize if this one doesn't fit very well, I've forgotten what I have and have not written.  
Though, there should still be quite a few chapters left nevertheless. **

**Again with my apology for the usual early morning unedits, so I'll fix those eventually.**

**Thank you wonderful people who reviewed, can't stress how much I appreciate it.  
Keep up the reviews, they fuel writing! **

**Extra thanks for Uncle Pasty for everything.  
**


	22. Rewrite: Don Juan Triumphant

**Disclaimer: If I owned _ViCTORiOUS, _I would've made this into multiple episodes rather than post it up here. And then I'd be murdered because of this chapter, so... yeah 8D. _Phantom of the Opera_ isn't mine either, don't get my ghost/murdered-self started on why.**

* * *

Fucking _ow_. Where the hell did he get a silencer from? Ugh, nevermind that… Beck had hit his head backwards pretty hard, and he was either cradling himself or unconscious right about now. I grabbed the gun from his hand and rolled from my side onto my back. Groaning, I thanked the ceiling that I fell onto him sideways rather than straight on.

There was a sharp pain from when I rolled, so I gently felt around my body with a free hand. The red dress shirt felt damp and there was a rip in the side. Ugh, fuck. I looked down and saw there was a darker red spreading on the fabric. With further examination I noted that the cut wasn't too deep, though it was quite long and bled like a bitch.

Beck was starting to stir so I ignored the… how do you describe the feeling of being cut by a bullet? Yeah, I don't know, but it was pretty fucking horrible. Probably one of, if not the the worst I've felt ever. What? I don't go around getting shot often, thanks. Anyway, I went to grab the second gun from his waist. After emptying the bullets out I threw the gun back at him as he woke up.

"You react funny." He giggled again. Concussed? Maybe. Don't care. "Just wait until the ending!"

I ignored him and went to remove most of my costume. It wouldn't be good if it was covered in blood. I tied the undershirt around myself in order to stall the bleeding so we could get back upstairs. There was no point yelling at him because it would just push him further over the edge. I swear, by the end of today my self control's going to be so overused that it'll go on vacation for a month. Or, you know. Permanently like it was before this. "Come on, we need to get back up."

Beck nodded his head groggily and groaned between giggles as we dusted ourselves off and looked for the stairs. The spare gun only had six bullets left, and I kept it in my pants pocket for good measure. Just in case Beck had something else up his sleeve or tried to pull something while we were alone. Luckily he didn't, so we got back to backstage in one piece. Uh, mostly. I was trying not to wince with each step.

At the top of the steps was a waiting Tori. "Oh my god, what happened to you?"

"Beck, go get changed." I turned to the wobbling Beck and tried to point him in the right direction. Literally, I had to point for him. The guy looked so fucking confused.

He shook his head and tried to slap me, but he was so out of it that he missed. "No, you're not the boss of me, I'm still running things."

"No, I don't think-" I rolled my eyes and let out a short sigh. "Okay, _fine_. You're still in charge. Would you _please_ go rest in your change room? You must need to after that fall, we'll come get you with the update." The words 'fine' and 'please' were said through grit teeth. That seemed to make him happy, so he wandered off to his rooms. "How much time do we have left?"

When I turned back to Tori she'd already gotten the first aid kit out. She passed me some rubbing alcohol, polysporin, and gauze. "Enough time for you to explain what the hell's going on. Trina, Cat and Robbie are extending their scenes. Andre said he'd wrap up his yelling soon so he could come join us. I figured you wouldn't want Cat here right now." In the background you could hear their voices ringing out, mainly Andre yelling at everyone. It was the scene where Sinjin was saying _Don Juan Triumphant_ was impossible to play, and Trina was making a fuss out of it.

"Good call." I hissed as the alcohol burned. "Long story short, Beck had guns and coke."

"Cocaine?" Tori yelped, and I shot her a look to ask her to shut up. Yeah, like the whole world needed to hear that after I spent all this time trying to hide it.

There was a moment's pause as I went to smear a coat of polysporin over the cut. "And guns?" Andre had appeared from out of nowhere, holding the gauze up for me. He didn't seem too alarmed by what he'd overheard, so I guess that was a good thing.

"Yeah." I started taping on the gauze. "I don't know if he seriously meant to shoot but he barely missed me. He might think the gun's still loaded but I took the bullets out of his, kept the other one just in case. There's only six left." After finishing up with the gauze I pulled out the gun to let Andre and Tori examine it. "He's really out of it, I'm not sure if he's concussed or anything. Looney Toon over there just wants me to keep the play going without letting anyone know what he's planning. Threatened to shoot everyone if I didn't listen to him, he says he still has some big finale planned."

"I get that." Tori and I looked at Andre like he was insane or had some explaining to do. He caught on fast and started clarifying. "There was this guy I used to hang out with, a while before I got into music and acting. I was into, uh... other things." I shrugged my shoulders at him to say it was okay, and to ask him to continue. "I wasn't too bad, but he was. Dude was pretty insecure and one day someone made him snap. They get pretty delusional, and really desperate about it. You've gotta play along, or else..."

Tori jumped in when he trailed off. "Or else?"

"He killed himself before we could get him help." Andre shook his head at the memory and Tori looked mortified. "I started straightening my life out after that."

I nodded my head. "One of you guys call... the police or an ambulance or something. Maybe they can help him. Until they're here we're just going to have to keep going for Beck and everyone else. Otherwise it's going to be hard to control him, and I really, really don't think it's worth spending the rest of my life in jail for shooting him." At the very least I was feeling slightly relieved that someone else knew about it. That someone could help and it wasn't all on me. Andre whipped out a change of clothing from behind him and I changed back with a cringe. "I'll go tell him his cue's soon, you guys get to your places when you're done."

We split up, Andre and Tori off in the opposite direction as I head towards the change rooms. Beck was in his room, rubbing the back of his head and popping some pills. Normally I'd safely guess it was an asprin or two, but right now I had no idea. The door was open, so I just knocked the frame to let him know I was there.

"Jade! Jade, Jade, Jadey Jade." He sang out, and I went back to trying not to punch him. "It's time for the the last scene, isn't it?"

I scowled slightly. "Yeah, my cue's up in sixty." We walked to our respective places behind set in an uncomfortable silence, which I awkwardly tried to break. "Time for the finale."

"One _nobody_ will forget." He said it with a tone that made me look at him weirdly, but he just shrugged and waved hello at me. ... Strange.

Anyway, my cue was before Beck's, so I hopped on stage. It was just a small filler scene. A dark bit where all you could see was our silhouettes as I knocked Sinjin out and tied him up. It was a scene where the man who would normally play male lead was supposed to appear on stage, except instead the Phantom knocked him out quickly and took his place. I took Sinjin's costume and put it on, making sure to avoid removing my dress shirt so nobody would see the bandage. Don Juan's shirt was similar to Red Death's suit in the common ground that they were both blood red. However, Don Juan's outfit was slightly more modern and seductive, where as Red Death's was very formal.

From there we skipped to the part of _Don Juan Triumphant_ where Aminta is supposed to be meeting Don Juan. This was a rewrite, afterall. We weren't going to do the entire _Don Juan Triumphant_ play. After receiving a note in the middle of the night asking- no, begging for her to join him so he could explain everything, she had rushed to the place he'd written. Cat was dressed in simple commoner clothing, a white blouse and tattered skirt. She seemed to be genuinely excited to wait for me, and I beamed as she was holding our roses instead of the originally planned red one.

A random stage crew member sang out. "_Master?_" From off stage I responded.

"_Passarino, go away!"_

Then I made my appearance. Cat was purposely standing the wrong way so that I could creep up behind her. A black mask covered my eyes, and my hair was combed properly. That was the main difference, really. We'd decided earlier that we'd skip the part where the Phantom sings about urges; half the girls thought it was creepy and the others who didn't said my singing was getting a bit much. So we rewrote it out.

"_Past the point of no return, no backward glances.  
The games we played 'til now are at an end.  
Past all thought of 'if' or 'when', no use resisting.  
Abandon thought and let the dream descend!_"

By then Cat had spun around to face me as I stalked towards her at a very slow pace.

_What raging fire shall flood the soul?  
__What rich desire unlocks its door?  
__What sweet seduction lies before us?_

Beck showed up late, pretending to be watching from a fake balcony on the edge of the stage. It was close to the frozen Cat that was standing there, she was on top of a makeshift staircase. Like a burned down building that only had a frame left.

_Past the point of no return, the final threshold.  
What warm unspoken secrets will we learn?  
Beyond the point of no return..."_

Cat didn't move from her spot, but she started the second half of our duet.

_"You have brought me to that moment where words run dry  
__to that moment where speech disappears into silence, silence.  
__I have come here hardly knowing the reason why.  
__In my mind I've already imagined our bodies entwining  
__defenseless and silent and now I am here with you.  
__No second thoughts, I've decided, decided._"

She blushed slightly at how she unintentionally emphasized the "bodies entwining" line. I grinned, accidentally ignoring the growing anger Beck was showing.

"_Past the point of no return, no going back now.  
Our passion play has now at last begun.  
__Past all thought of right or wrong, one final question:  
__How long should we two wait before we're one?_"

Cat and I now held an intense stare, one that can only be described by mutual lust. Whether it be the acting or conflicted feelings, I didn't care. It was awesome.

"_When will the blood begin to race  
__the sleeping bud burst into bloom?  
__When will these flames at last consume us?_"

She nodded her head to give me permission, we were to sing the last verse together if she was comfortable enough.

"_Past the point of no return, the final threshold  
__the bridge is crossed, so stand and watch it burn.  
__We've passed the point of no return._"

I was just about at Cat by now, it took me forever only because I had to go down one flight of stairs and up another one to reach her. Our moment was cut short by the sound of clicking.

_Click, click, click_. Beck was shooting the empty gun at Cat. He made a strangled noise of frustration and I sighed in relief that I'd taken the bullets out. But then a different flash of silver sprung out. _No!_ To my horror, Cat turned around just in time to see Beck jump across the nearby stage prop and thrust a five or so inch switchblade into her. He had a wide smile on at my reaction, the only thing I can compare it to is the Joker from Batman. Then Beck pulled the blade upwards a little, causing Cat to make a weird noise of pain.

"Drop your weapon! Put your hands on your head, now!" The audience was gasping madly in their seats, and the yell seemed to come from that general area. I didn't bother looking. I didn't even really wonder when they got here. They were too late, anyway. Just like me. How didn't I know? I should've checked him for more weapons. A million things were running through my head as I sprinted towards them. Beck had thrown Cat slightly when he saw me coming at them, and I went to pick her up as she fell. Instead I was held back and grabbed by Beck, who panicked and decided it would be a good idea to fill the stereotype and use me as a human shield. Another shout from the police rang out after he held me hostage. "I said drop your weapon!"

"No! You-"

I stopped listening after that. My vision was blurring. Tears? Yeah. Bloody fucking Tears. I didn't bother resisting, he had the knife pressed against my neck. Besides, why would I? Tori and Andre looked terrified, officers were trying to drag them out of the sidelines. The audience was screaming but I couldn't hear them. I didn't care. There were so many things wrong with this- no, wrong with me? I spent all my time trying to find what I was looking for, just to brush past it because it was right in front of me. When I go to fix things, I fuck everybody around me up. Is that what I do? Fuck everyone up? Maybe I've been selfish all along. These were the things I tried to hide with my attitude, the fears and insecurities that I think only Cat could see through to.

Turning my head to distance myself from those thoughts, I saw what I didn't want to see the most. Cat was lying in a small pool of blood that was rapidly growing. In the back of the auditorium was EMS, impatiently waiting for the police to clear things up. Then I zoned out, staring at Cat's blood. She just kept... bleeding. How could something so inexplicably beautiful get so utterly broken?

It was only when Beck ran the knife up against my cheek that I snapped out of my wallowing state. I felt the cool blade cut through my cheek, its wetness meeting my own. Cat's blood and mine mixing together, for Beck's blade was still soaked in hers. That snapped my thoughts into further overdrive. Maybe EMS could save Cat. She couldn't be dead already. Maybe, just maybe they could still save her. But not if the police have to reason with Beck. He would take forever to control, and they can't shoot him with me as his shield. I've seen the shows, read the articles, heard the stories. Cat would bleed out before they manage to get me safely away from Beck. How do I stop being his shield...?

... They can shoot me.

"Shoot me!" I yelled, suddenly. Everyone went quiet, including Beck. "You can shoot me..." I trailed off, tears falling freely. "It doesn't matter if I'm alive and she's not."

Everybody froze, probably not knowing what to do. When nobody took the shot, I remembered something. I still have Beck's Walther PPK. The one with bullets, in my pocket. I reached inside and aimed the gun diagonally upwards. It would hit him somewhere in the chest area, I hoped. I wasn't out to kill him, but if that's what the outcome was... I'm not sure how I'd feel about it. Part of me wanted him to pay, the bit that wasn't blaming myself for all of this was fuming at him. Why didn't he get help, how could he have let things go so far? Some half of me blamed him for this. Wanted him bleeding on the floor instead of Cat. Revenge, almost. Maybe it wasn't a rational idea, but again, I didn't care. There wasn't time to be rational with Cat's life on the line.

"This was- _is_, me trying to do things right. I'm sorry, Cat." Before anyone could react I pulled the trigger, sending the bullet cascading through my body and into Beck's. We both fell, and the last thing I saw was the tears in Cat's eyes.

**_-To be Continued-_**

* * *

**A/N:  
... Hi, please don't kill me.  
It's 4:08am, this thing is just a little tweaked here and there.  
I think this one needs a lot of editing, sorry about that.**

**CLIFFHANGERS!  
You don't particularly like how it's ended, me neither.**

**So uh, please review. I may have a hard time finding motivation. :T  
Though I have many ideas, so this is definitely not the end (... I'd hate me if it was).  
And if you really must know, things _will_ get better.  
However, this is the last "Rewrite" chapter. **

**Thanks to those of you who do review. c:  
I check, and on the contrary, they really do make me go faster.  
(On the occasion that I see about 10 or so I get all hyped up. XD)**

**Peace Out, bro. A sincere thank you again.**


	23. ICU: Nightmares and Death

**Disclaimer: I had a really great disclaimer for this one.  
...But then I forgot it. Just like how you forgot I don't own _ViCTORiOUS_ or _Phantom of the Opera_! So we're even.**

* * *

_Tap. Tap. Tap. _The clicking of ... heels? Some sort of shoes were walking in.

"_Jade?_ You're going to miss your cue, _please wake up_." Cat was looking down at me worriedly. I blinked a few times. Huh?

"But you...?" I was lying on my back in the middle of the auditorium. It was still dim lit and dressed for the _Don Juan_ scene, but I could make out that nobody was around besides us. The audience was empty, backstage was quiet. Actually, the whole place was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Really weird. "And I..." I trailed off to stare down where I could've swore a bullet had shot me. Nothing. No pain, no blood, no wound. Looking back up to see if Cat was unharmed as well I noticed that she was gone. There was no sound to tell me she'd left, though. So w-

What the fuck! I leaped backwards to dodge being burned as amateur pyrotechnology shot from the edge of the stage. What idiot set that up! Real flames accentuated the whole "Fiery Hell" concept of _Don Juan_'s scene. Slowly sound started to spread around me, the soft repetitive tapping of a ride cymbal that was nearly hidden behind the pulsing of bass notes. It mimicked my heartbeat, throbbing in fear at the sense of danger. It was steady and tried to stay calm like I did, but you could hear the hidden feeling behind it. The flames surrounded me so that I was stuck on stage, and the props were slowly starting to burn as well. Fuck, there was only one exit I could take with everything burning like this. I'd have to run out the back.

Left and right, up and down. Burning things were falling, lighting other things on fire. More and more things were becoming ablaze, from curtains to makeshift backgrounds to furniture and everything in between. As much as I ran it seemed like things just kept coming, where was the end? Actually, where the hell was everybody? Did they do this on purpose? Oh jeez. As I ducked under a burning stairwell I noticed that there was an exit nearby, but also someone sleeping at the top. How the hell could they be sleeping now, with the loud bass and scorching flames? Why the fuck wasn't the music disconnected yet, everything's on fucking fire! I'm no superhero, so I meant to leave and get help for whoever they were. But that was before my eyes caught the color red. A different red than the flames, it wasn't tinted orange. Red velvet colored red.

"Cat!" I ran up the stairs, disregarding the flames that licked my body. It felt like molten lava was flowing through my veins. For barely a second it registered that I should probably be feeling heat on the outside rather than inside, but this wasn't the time to wonder about trivial things like that. Cat was lying at the top in the same position I saw her after Beck... No time to freeze up, idiot. Have to get her out of here. Just when I went to scoop her up she slipped through my grasp. What? Cat fell off the top and through the floor as everything around us crumbled under the flames. How! I was sure I- Shit. The crumbling was spreading fast, as if it chose to chase me. There was no time to think, I just jumped down after Cat.

Neither of us hit the floor. It was as though the world had faded away into black. Besides Cat being barely in my view up ahead, nothing else existed. It was all pitch black. Not the kind of _'I'm in my room with the lights off' _or _'my eyes are closed' _black, I mean pitch fucking black. And I tried to reach her, I really did. I stretched, I reached, I ran, I even swam. Gravity didn't exist, it was like... like the scene from Hercules where he jumps into the River Styx to claim Megara's soul to bring her back. Heh.

Eventually the sight of Cat grew faint until it disappeared. Then I was left standing, floating alone in the darkness. I just... you're probably wondering why I'm not thinking much. But honestly speaking, I don't know what's going on. None of this makes any bloody motherfucking sense. And somehow I was strangely calm about it, like nothing mattered. There was nothing to think about, it was... nice. I'd expect myself to be freaking out right about now, thinking this is Hell and that I brought it on myself. Going back to my usual self destructive habits without Cat, especially because of what happened. But it was okay, everything felt okay. Like I didn't register what happened properly. Denial? worries, it was much better than remember-

"_Jade! Cat!_" The anguished yell of Andre? Different voices, all yelling our names.

... What? What was this?

"_I'm not dead!_" A low cough from Beck. "_You can't kill me, just look at you!_"

In the darkness a light started to form, and leisurely I walked towards it. It made the yelling stop, so it couldn't be all bad, right? I really didn't want to be a schizophrenic, thanks. There was a strange show going on, coming from an old movie projector. You know, the metal ones that have two rolls of film and used to play for drive-in theatres? It was a large screen, like I was at a cinema that had no sound or something. When the projector noticed that I'd come up to it, the movie changed. A black and white version of my most over-thought memories of Cat had started playing. From moments that made me think _'why didn't I know it was you?_' to singing karaoke to recording vlogs together to more recent things like being able to see her close up before we kissed.

I don't know how long I sat there watching them, reminiscing. Definitely longer than seconds or minutes, but in terms of hours, days, weeks, months or years? I couldn't tell. Though maybe the last two were an exaggeration. But I knew one thing, I'd never be bored of it. If this was my fate, then so be it. I was probably dead anyway, why not enjoy this before something like the fire consumes me again? After a while the memories changed, started going through every last speck of the happy times I'd had. Some were things that I'd forgotten, so it was... refreshing, I guess.

Just as the memories ran out and started to repeat from the beginning, the invisible screen started to burn from the centre like someone struck a match beneath it. I sighed. "I guess that's that, then."

"What's what, _Jade?_" From through the burning screen walked Cat, now wearing the wedding dress from the Masquerade.

She gave me a hug that I held on to tightly for a long time, she had to lightly nudge me away. "Nothing, nothing. This is just nice."

"_I'm back_ now." Cat paused and tugged my hand, having us slowly dance to no music. "_And I'm so sorry_. You do _remember me?_"

I nodded. "I don't think I could forget you, ugh." A small groan.

"Too lovey?" She smiled cutely at me.

Both of us chuckled, knowing the answer. "Yeah."

It was short and quiet, but it was comfortable. We didn't need any more than that. Or at least, I didn't. "We can't stay like this forever, you know." I kept quiet as if to ask her to continue, and she understood. "_Living in a world without you... _I'm_ drowning in the past. It's _like_ living in no world at all_. You're not dead, Jade. You're stuck dreaming, and you hate admitting when you're scared, but I know anyway. _You can get through this._ _Please wake up, I miss you_."

I pulled her close to me as she started crying. She was starting to fade away, and everything was getting lighter; our time was running out. "_Jade please, I need you..._" were the last words I heard her say before she fully disappeared. The pitch black was gone and replaced by the sound of crying and sniffles. It was still pretty dark but I found that when I blinked a few times, my real surroundings came back. The outlines of things could barely be seen, a small light was on near my bed to the right. I guess that made it night time. There was no mindfuck or trickery with this, I could tell this was the real world because... well, it hurt like a bitch. My body felt stiff, like I'd been lying on my back for a long time.

_Beep... Beep... Beep..._

A high pitched, monotonous tone beeping...? Oh. Right, shot myself. Hospital, makes sense. I tried to move. Ow. Pain, makes sense. Oh hey, look at you brain, going around making sense of things and not being crazy anymore. Congratufreakinglations. There was a bunch of wires or I.V.s stuck on or in me all over the place, it felt like I was an experiment from X-Men or something. Ugh. I groaned slightly. What happened to giving patients painkillers? Monitors or machines to my right, and to my left was- I blinked a couple more times to make sure. Cat! She was sitting on the edge of her own bed, looking out the window. Sure she had her back to me, but I could still see. Alive, breathing, heart beating Cat. The weight of the world? Yeah, off my fucking shoulders. My moment of relief was cut short when I noticed that the sniffling and crying was coming from her.

"Cat?" My throat felt like sandpaper- wait, no. That was a severe understatement. It felt like a planet of deserts had a sandstorm party for a couple of weeks and left in the morning without cleaning up. Either way, you could hear it in my voice. It was... weird. More raspy than usual. Cat turned to see me and grinned like a cheshire cat after, but ended up crying harder instead. I cleared my throat, trying to get my voice back. "What's wrong?"

Slowly she made her way over to my side of the room, and it was only when she sat down on the edge of my bed that I noticed. In the dim light I could tell she was paler than usual, like she was sick. She looked tired, like walking over took all of her energy. It even sounded like she was having a hard time breathing, maybe it was just me? I hoped. It was devastating to see. I shrugged my shoulder slightly to ask her to lie down with me and explain. I couldn't console her much with all the things tied to me, but I tried the best I could as she pressed herself gently to my side and cried. "I've been waiting for you to wake up, but your timing sucks, Jade. Why did you have to wake up _just_ in time to watch me die?"

* * *

**A/N:  
Hurro Hurro! Please don't hate me (again. I'll keep saying it).  
Thank you for still reading (and reviewing! I really appreciate it).  
ICU stands for Intensive Care Unit in Hospitals, this will be the Hospital/ICU Arc.  
Also, return of the cliffhangers 8).**

I'm sorry if you didn't like this chapter, by the way.  
It was a bit different.  
But there's so much in store for these two!  
And as much as I want to tell you about it?  
You'll just have to wait and see to find out.  
_Mweehehehe!_  


**Reviews make me go faster (and you really want me to go faster, these sad chapters make me write slow XD) as you all know.  
BUT WITH THIS LIMITED TIME OFFER, YOU ALSO WIN ME SERENADING YOU WITH GUITAR.  
... You don't want that? Fine. I have fudgesicles, take one.  
**


	24. ICU: The Damage Done

**Disclaimer: _ViCTORiOUS _and_ Phantom of the Opera_, own I do not.**

* * *

"What..." I paused. There were so many ways to end that. What are you saying, what happened, what's going on, what day is it, what's killing you... So many questions that needed to be asked. I guess there was too much running through my mind; I didn't know where to start.

Cat sniffled and rest her head on my shoulder, carefully letting one of her arms float over my waist. Like she thought I was fragile or something. With the way things looked I was more scared that _she_ would break. "It's... still early, Jade." She interjected before I could pick which question to ask first. "The doctors won't be in until morning, can we just ... stay like this? For a while. Until they check on us." She spoke as though she thought that I'd leave her. Was I really gone that long?

"Sure, Cat." I managed to mutter out, almost inaudibly. She sighed and I knew she heard me. Ignoring the groaning aches of my body, I tilted my head enough to kiss the top of hers lightly and then rest my cheek there. Both of us needed the comfort, and we knew it. Just I didn't know the specifics of it, that's all.

After a while I noticed Cat was breathing a slow and steady pace, signifying that she'd fallen asleep. Good, it seemed like much needed rest. In the meanwhile I didn't want to sleep, nor did I feel like I needed to. After all, I'd just gotten up. So I sat there, racking my brain for hours. Could Cat really be dying? Why would she be dying? How was she dying, was it painful? A couple hours later the city sky was lightening through our window, and I started tracing light patterns onto Cat's arm to calm myself. It was frustrating, having to wait and not know.

Eventually morning came and Cat started to stir, but both of us remained quiet. It wasn't a good quiet, more like neither of us wanted to discuss what was going on. Having so much time to worry about it was… frightening. Some part of me didn't want to know because I simply didn't want to acknowledge it. Thus neither of us said anything, just lay there holding the other while trying to appreciate the moment. It was better than having to face the horrible truth.

The sounds of busy streets were starting to fill our ears as what I assumed was the morning rush hour began. We both sighed. I guess that meant that a doctor would come in soon. Cat dozed off again as I tried to summon the strength to gently pet her hair. I really needed to get up and move to work off the stiffness, but this was more important.

Shortly afterwards a doctor waltzed on in before almost tripping on his own feet. "Whoa." Good job, doc. Great vocabulary you've got there. I figured he was thrown off by the fact that Cat was in my bed and I was indeed awake. "You're Jade?"

Huh. Not a bad looking guy. Kind of clean cut, somewhere between dorky and formal. Pretty young, too. Fresh out of medical school, I'd guess. Looks like he'd be real popular with the- Hold up a second. It'd have to ask Cat about it later, but it'd be a real shame if I had to hurt him for hitting on her. Rules schmules, nobody resists Cat. I stared at him with an unamused look and cleared my throat.

"Oh!" He exclaimed, before I shot him a glare to request that he not wake up Cat with his talking. "Oh yeah." His voice dropped to a whisper. He left and made it to the corner before pausing and walking backwards. Peeking his head into the room again, he winced at his forgetfulness. "Sorry. You want something to drink, right?" I nodded. "Apple or orange?" With my free hand I held up one finger to say the first one. "Right, I'm on it."

Then the dork put both arms in the air and jogged down the hallway like he was pretending to be Superman or something. Good lord, what kind of looney toon bin did they put us in?

A couple of minutes later he returned like a normal person, and this time he brought a large plastic cup of apple juice with him. I tried to give him a small smile, but saying thanks was never my thing. Damn, the juice was good. Or maybe it was just because I was thirsty.

"That's the good stuff, y'know. Swiped it from the staff room instead of the crapeteria." He tried again when I seemed to finish drinking. "So, Jade right?"

"That's my name, don't wear it out." Hah. Attitude, how I missed you. "And thanks. You're...?"

"No problem-o, and it's Dr. Greenacre." No first name? Eh. I'll get it out of him eventually. Until then, doc it was. "Did any of the machines go off when you woke up?"

"Nope. I just woke up, talked to Cat, and here we are now."

He nodded his head and I noticed a crowd was starting to form outside of the room. For the most part the room we were in had large windows or glass walls, making sure that outside could see in and inside could see out. The only way to get privacy was to close the curtains that were left open. "What's the last thing you remember, then? Poppin' a cap into-" I shot him a _seriously? _look and he put his hands up in mock surrender.

"Too soon, doc. Way too soon." Hm. Was he trying to be funny, or was he just a wannabe? Eh. I shrugged on the inside. It was kind of an amusing distraction. I figured it would be best to answer his questions before asking my own anyway. "A lot of blood, and yes, I remember shooting myself to shoot Beck. Beck stabbed Cat." Okay... that came out a lot less articulate than I wanted it to.

Greenacre pulled out a stethoscope from a nearby drawer and walked to the side that didn't have the sleeping Cat. "Now don't scream rape or something, I'm just going to check you out."

... What the sense of humor? "I'm flattered, and taken." I raised an eyebrow jokingly but he didn't seem to get that I was kidding back. Can't a girl joke too?

"I-" He looked so alarmed by what he thought was my accusation that I had to actually try to keep myself from laughing. "I meant physically! No, no!" He sighed. "I just need to check your stats and make sure you're okay."

Rolling my eyes, I went along with the check up. "Just kidding, doc." A pause as he read the transcripts from a neighboring machine. "You and Cat must've gotten along well, with how gullible you are and all that word vomit."

"Cat's a very nice girl," was all he murmured. She let you call her that? Damn. A twinge of jealousy hit before I remembered how she did that with everyone.

"So..." I began. It seemed he was done with his questions and I figured it was about time for mine. No time better than the present, or something like that. "You gonna tell me what happened to all of us?"

Greenacre seemed to consider telling me before pursing his lips and shaking his head lightly. "I think Cat wanted to, Jade. She talked about you and talking to you all the time." Huh. I wonder what she said to him about us.

"Yeah, but maybe that isn't such a good idea, doc." He gave me a disapproving look. I rolled my eyes in exasperation, my patented response. "Come on, at least you have to tell me _something_."

"Well, you're all clear for now." He smiled. "Though, we're going to have to run some more tests on you later to check your stability. Right about now, you seem fine. Could dance around the hallway or something if you want."

Getting slightly irritated at him avoiding my question here. "Okay, and this is the hallway of…?"

"Ah, right. You're at the Times of Grace Medical and Treatment Center, in the ICU. I'm chief of staff of this wing and-" I snickered. "Hey! What was that for?"

"You. You're the chief of staff? Who were you up against for that, Daffy Duck?" He frowned. "What, you seem kinda young."

His frown turned into a pout and I had to stop myself from stating that he's just proving my point. "I'll have you know that I-"

"Yeah, yeah doc. Save all the bells and whistles for somebody else. I was just messin' again. We're at the Times of Grace place in the ICU and you're the chief. Now doc, what's wrong with us?" For a second I considered renaming him Chief, but nah.

"_Jade_."

"Pfft. Don't you _Jade_ me. If Cat really talked about me all the time, you'll know I'll win this." Gotcha.

He thought for a second, and then groaned. "You win. When you shot yourself you were pretty lucky. The bullet missed all the arteries nearby and your ribs, instead it blew up your spleen. _Kaboom_." … Yes, because my spleen needs your sound effects. "So we spent a couple hours in surgery and managed to clean that up, removed your spleen and then… hit some complications. You were bleeding too much. There was uh, a lot of scary moments but eventually we ended up putting you in a medically induced coma."

"Uh… Alright." Have you ever heard about what's happened to yourself while not conscious? It's kind of weird to hear about things like this, especially when they're life or death. Whatever, that wasn't my main concern. Things about me could wait. "What about Cat?"

"Can I explain that one last, please?" I went to argue with him about that but he had this look on his face. It was… so sad. It scared me to the point where I just nodded in response; judging from his reaction, I wouldn't want to hear what he had to say about her. "Beck's on the other side of this wing." _What_? I guess the concern was written on my face. "Don't worry; cops have to follow him everywhere. They're stationed at his door and walk him places, even secure the bathroom before he uses it." Greenacre tried to suppress a snicker at the last bit. "He's almost good to go, but you did put him in a life or death situation there." Argh fuck. "The bullet grazed his heart but we managed to stall the bleeding enough to repair it. It took a while, but now he's recovering well." Oh, good. The fact that he was stuck in the ICU also meant he'd have to stay clean.

Then an awkward silence filled the air. It was probably just a short pause, but I was nervous; worried. It felt like forever before he sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Cat sustained life threatening injuries, mostly because Beck pulled the blade up." I grit my teeth, all remorse for shooting Beck fading. "We spent the longest time trying to repair Cat, and for the most part she's making a good recovery."

"But?" There had to be a but, I knew it. And his lack of clumsy humor meant it was going to be one hell of a serious one. Sweet Jesus. I tried to prepare myself for what was coming.

"Her liver's still damaged." Greenacre spoke quietly and wouldn't meet my eye. You could tell he was fond of Cat, she had that thing that made everyone love her. I kept quiet so he would continue. "She needs to take a bit from someone else, her current one isn't healing fast enough; it's already failing her. It was the only thing we couldn't fix."

"Oh." I tried to remain calm. She just needed a donor, it would be okay. It would be okay, she just needed a donor. The sentence just kept repeating in my head. It made me less… lucid. "Who?"

"Your friends, Victoria and Andre? They practically lived here with you two for the first week." He smiled sadly to himself. "They were the first to be tested, but they didn't match. Neither did her parents, and her brother refuses to let us test him." I scowled. That bastard. "We think it's unlikely that he's a match, though."

Forgetting to keep my voice down, I ended up raising my voice a little. "What about me, have you tested me?"

"Well, not on purpose, but we had your information from when we operated on you and… yeah, you're a match." Thank god. "But you won't be cleared by the hospital as physically stable enough in time to donate." … That doesn't exist because if he did then I'd be able to save Cat."

Machines had started beeping a tad bit faster, but I didn't pay attention to them as my emotions ran high. "What? How much time does she have? And what do you mean I'm not fucking _physically stable_ enough?" He winced at my swearing. "I fucking _shot _myself so I could save Cat, woke up from a coma that _you _guys put me in, and now you're saying I can't help her because I'm not _physically stable _enough? You said I could dance down the freakin' hallways!"

"You probably can, yeah. But it's protocol, Jade. I can't break protocol for you. By the time all the test results are back to say you're fully functional Cat'll be…" He trailed off.

"How much-" I started yelling, but a cold hand rubbed against my arm. I woke Cat up. Great. Fucking hell.

She didn't get up or anything, just tapped that one hand that was holding onto my arm. The room stayed quiet until she spoke softly; the small, cold, broken voice of a beautiful girl that was now clinging to my side like I was her lifeline. "About a month, they said. You've been asleep for three weeks, Jade." Three _weeks_? "So about a week left, give or take."

A week. That's all…? That couldn't be all that Cat had left for life, there had to be more time for her; for us. After another silent pause I managed to croak out the last question. "Is there anybody that-"

"Don't, Jade." Cat's voice was starting to crack. No, I just… Why? Just… it couldn't be true, _no_. "Please don't ask."

"I…" I begged Greenacre with my eyes. Both Cat and I were holding back tears, but you could hear it in our voices. Cat sounded so hollow, like someone ripped all the happiness out of her. The sweetness she always had in her was dying. I didn't even really recognize my voice at this point, it sounded so desperate; like I was breaking. It's like I was dying with her.

He didn't speak up immediately, but when he finally did I felt the warmth of Cat's wet tears seep through the thin hospital shirt they'd put us in. I felt my own tears stream quietly down my cheeks as the reality of it all hit me. In the background multiple monitors were beeping faintly and you could hear the footsteps of the patients, doctors and nurses outside. It all felt so far away, the only thing I could really feel was Cat's body shaking against mine in quiet sobs. Eventually Greenacre had spit out one solitary name, and it was "Beck".

* * *

**A/N:  
That wasn't exactly a cliffhanger.  
But I bet you guys want to kill me anyway, amirite.**

**Hi.  
****I've been learning _Phantom of the Opera_ songs on the piano, it's awesome.  
... 'cept I need somebody to sing Christine's part.  
*Awkward silence/crickets*.  
Yeah, that's what it sounds like when her parts come up.**

**Anyhow, this took longer than expected because I hit a snag.  
Your reviews got me through, for the most part.  
For that I thank you, and hope you'll continue R&Ring. c8**

**... So that's what happens when I write/post before 4am!  
I'm proper and not funny. Weird. **


	25. ICU: Hey Beck, I love her

**Disclaimer: Again? Okay, I- here, have a haiku.**

**Hello there reader!**  
**I don't own ViCTORiOUS,**  
**but I wish I did.**

* * *

Have you ever… felt guilty for existing? It's probably the reason why I go around saying I hate everything, because in a sense I guess I really do. Everything seems so fucking bittersweet and unfair. Sure, I'm whining, but can you blame me? It takes a lot to not constantly wonder about all the wasted time; I mean, really. That one person you could just sit there and feel comfortable being quiet with. I'm impatient and she's a chatterbox, but... it was okay- ugh, _fuck_.

Tears. Copious amounts of tears that would've flooded the entire hospital if we were cartoons. I think for an hour, maybe more? Greenacre left earlier, he said he had some rounds to do and he'd give us some privacy. We didn't talk, what was there to say? Okay, maybe there was a lot to say. But it would all be bittersweet, and we knew better than to start. What was the point? It was better to just leave things quiet for now. Halfway in Cat cried herself to sleep, so here I am; holding her to reassure myself that she's still there. I hate crying, and my tears've stopped running by now. Yet I feel like I still want to, like my head's saying _cry_ and my body's saying _out of tears, sorry try again later_.

But Cat makes for a good distraction; I'm constantly tracing light patterns on her skin or gently petting her hair. Every so often I kiss her cheek or forehead; sometimes I just pull her a little closer. There's a vicious cycle going on in my head, one that I don't want or really know how to deal with. I can always pretend it's not there, but we all know that's just a quick fix.

I was so busy wallowing in whatever the fuck you want to call it that I didn't notice Greenacre had come back. He poked the arm I had around Cat before nudging it gently. "Cat, hey Cat." She stirred. "Yeah you. You asked me to make sure you were awake today, remember?"

"Mmm?" Cat murmured before suddenly sitting upright and cringed in pain. "Owww." I didn't bother hiding the horrified look on my face. "Oh, no! It's okay Jade, I'm just stiff from sleeping funny. Not that sleeping on you's funny, I like sleeping on you, you're comfortable. Just I haven't for such a long time and I-"

Greenacre flailed his arms around to interrupt her and all three of us smiled. I didn't know why they were smiling, but I grinned because it was good to hear Cat ramble; the last several hours were so… different of her that I was scared I'd shit a brick next.

"It's almost eleven! The pediatric kids are already setting up on stage." Oh, so that's why they were both smiling like idiots. "You still up for performing today?"

Cat turned to look at me with this gleam in her eye, one that I've missed. For a second, it was like we're back to normal and there's nothing wrong. "Oh Jade! You have to come see! One day I was walking around with Travis," I smirked and looked at the doctor who was now coughing sheepishly in a corner. Travis, eh. "And there were all these sad kids so I asked why they were sad and it turns out a lot of them have all these sad stories right? So I said that talent shows usually make me happy because I love to sing and Travis thought it was a good idea and the kids were all like 'yay'!." She paused to beam happily at me. "I taught some of them how to sing and now we're putting on a show!"

"A show, huh?" I raised a playful eyebrow. I wasn't about to kill Cat's mood. "Are the twerps any good?"

The question seemed to be for Green- Excuse me, _Travis_, but I knew Cat would jump up before he could respond anyway. "Jade! Don't be mean." I chuckled at how she scolded me. "It's the effort that counts."

"You mean it's _the thought_ that counts?" Reflexively I smirked. "I'll bet you give them all _an 'A' for effort_!"

She swatted at me playfully and I laughed, bringing an arm up to mockingly block. "You know what I mean! You're going to come watch us, right?" Cat threw in a pout for safe measure.

"If I have to." My tone was pretty annoyed, but she knew better.

"Good."

There was a comfortable few seconds of silence where I realized Cat was probably using all of her strength to keep up the peppy image that was once herself. She was trying so hard and I… well, I had started to lean in for a kiss when I heard a fake cough from Travis.

"Sooooo." He started. Is it possible for a person to look smug, embarrassed and awkward at the same time? The answer is yes. "Sorry to interrupt, but Jade needs to run some tests, and _you_," Travis paused to joke glare at Cat. "Need to help those kids before they think finger painting the entire room is a good idea. You left your toothbrush and stuff in the bathroom there anyway."

Cat sighed dramatically before trying to go back to her happy. But her smile was softer, the tiredness was visibly returning. "It's in the conference room. We're going to have lunch at noon and it'll start at one, is that okay?"

I waved goodbye as she was already pretty much at the door by the time I responded. "Conference room, lunch noon, show one. Got it."

"Uh, Jade might be a little late, Cat." She frowned and I quirked an eyebrow again. "But she'll definitely make it, no worries." This seemed to satisfy Cat, as she waved back and slowly skipped down the hallway.

"And I'm going to be late because…?"

Travis smiled in a way that was different, like he had a hidden side to him. "Thought you'd need an excuse to talk to Beck. I figured you'd have a hard time explaining it to Cat."

"Uh…" Wasn't he supposed to convince me _out_ of talking to Beck? And I wouldn't lie to Cat about it if she asked, but I suppose he had a point. "Thanks."

"No problem, best of luck." His personality noticeably changed back to peppy–klutz. "I'd like to see Cat real happy again too, y'know!" Kind of suspicious about what just happened I started to wonder what that was about. Er, wait. Right, pressed for time. I nodded my head at him and went off to the bathroom for a morning routine.

After I finished brushing my teeth I walked back into the room and found a note on one of the pillows.

**Room 24  
**_I would take you but I have some business to look after. You know how it is.  
It's the same floor; turn left and follow the orange line until you see the room.  
I'll come back around noon so we can go to Pediatrics together – but take your time, I can wait!  
P.S. Two words: GUILT TRIP.  
- Travis Greenacre_

I folded the note and put it in my pocket before walking out of the room. Nurses and doctors that were on duty sent a wave of polite smiles, curt nods and friendly waves to say Hello. Orange paint caught my eye as I was nodding back at them, so I quickly rounded the corner and followed the hallways.

There were two medium sized policemen guarding Beck's door, a large gray sign posted behind them to verify that it was indeed room 24. They looked like pretty friendly people, considering the fact that they were supposed to be watching a teenager who shot his friends during a drug-induced psychotic break.

"Hey, I'm-"

The taller one interrupted me. "Jade West!"

"Uh, yeah, and-"

"You're here to speak with Beck!" The second one piped in.

I paused for a second to make sure they were done. "Are you going to…?"

"To what?" They asked in unison.

"Finish my sentences, I guess not." I smirked, feeling less annoyed. They scrambled to open the door for me and followed me inside. I guess the room was soundproof just in case whoever was inside yelled; I couldn't hear the loud music blasting from outside.

Beck was carefully being watched by a third police officer, a strong looking fellow. That aside, the room was pretty bare. Nobody was around to play the drum intro for his song, but I recognized it from the guitar. Beck was seated on the far end of the bed, I think probably his one hour or something of free time?

_In the day by day collision  
called the art of growing up,  
there's an innocence we look for in the stars._

He stared at me and paused to wait for me to sing the response. I sighed softly; I was the one who showed him this song. It was one of mine, after all.

_To be taken back to younger days,  
when there was no giving up  
on the people we held closest to our hearts._

I watched as his eyes became apologetic when they asked to sing the next verse. My guess would be that he was trying to get some point across with the lyrics, but… I really hoped I was wrong.

_Yeah, it is you that I remember in the glowing;  
it is you that took my first away from me.  
It is you I set my standards to, to every walk of life,  
I haven't met another you since you were with me._

Originally it should've been angry, the verse was supposed to be filled with rage. But the song didn't suit either of our voices, and somehow Beck made it sound sad instead. He stopped playing then, and I guess it was supposed to be his interpretation of the song. The room was quiet as most sound had been cut off, but I whisper-hissed the chorus anyway.

_Sing with me!  
A brief bout with a razorblade cut me;  
I freaked out thinking people didn't love me.  
I watched closely as the you I knew forgot me;  
In letting go, I am so proud of what I've done._

A moment or two went by, my thoughts filling the room with deaf sound. The officers shuffled amongst themselves and sent an uncomfortable glance or two to the other. Readying themselves for if anything happened? Maybe, maybe.

"But I'm not proud of what I've done." Beck spoke, finally breaking our silence. I still didn't know what to say to that, so I let the silence spread again. "I'm sorry about what happened, Jade. But you have to understand, you aren't supposed to be with Cat."

"Excuse me?" I sat down on the edge of the bed and faced him. "What's that supposed to mean?"

I didn't censor myself in time and we both looked a little bit shocked at my… accidental quoting, let's call it. I felt and looked a little sheepish before noticing the hurt expression on Beck's face. "Like that, you're not like that. I know you, Jade. _We_'re supposed to be together."

"Then why would you-" I shook my head. "No, you know what? It… doesn't matter. Cat and I are different, we _have_ something different, something you and I both know we lacked."

"No!" The policemen stiffened as Beck raised his voice and practically dropped the guitar into its stand. Luckily he seemed to control his emotions again, or at least enough to lower his voice. "It was my fault, you weren't getting jealous anymore and I was losing you. I thought Tori could make you jealous for me again, that would fix it. We can still fix it."

It felt bad to be doing this; I'd never wanted to hurt Beck in this way. "_No_." I looked straight into his pleading eyes; it was time he finally got the picture. "I _am_ with Cat now, and-"

"I could've tried harder, I'll try harder." Determination and denial now strong in his voice.

"It works, Beck. Like we never did, it feels good." I ran a hand through my hair. "We were together just because. We figured why not, and there wasn't a reason not to until now. You liked the attention, I liked the image. It made sense then. Not anymore; it's done, gone, over, and I think you already know why I'm here, do I really have to say it?"

The room was quiet for a while. Maybe for a half hour or so? There was a lot for both of us to think about, a lot of things to absorb. It was quite a while later before Beck broke the silence. "You want me to be Cat's donor. Save your _girlfriend_'s life." He spat the word like it was venom.

Unintentionally, my voice broke. "Please."

"You never say please." He whispered, voice faltering. "And you don't cry… You said it's humiliating."

"Well, I am." I hissed back. "For her, I am. So I'll ask again. Please, Beck? If you're really sorry, you'll do this for me."

After about fifteen minutes or so I took the silence as my answer. The two officers followed me as I decided to take my leave, but I paused when a faint voice muttered something while I reached for the door handle. "Say that again?" A hint of hope, maybe?

"You were saying something. You _are_ with Cat now and what, Jade?" It wasn't a real question, or if it was he didn't sound like he wanted to hear the answer.

I blinked numbly and left the room. _Tell me you don't, Jade! You don't, you can't!_ There was shouting and loud thuds to be heard down the hall until I shut the door properly. _Mr. Oliver, you need to calm down! _The two officers had run back inside to assist their colleague. _Snap, snap, snappity snap of cuffs to metal bed posts. _Things I would hear for a long time without Cat.

Outside I noticed a clock on the wall said noon; I guess my judgment of time was a little off. I thanked Travis mentally for covering for me, I'd need a minute or two before I could face Cat. Leaning against the door, I sighed at my thoughts. "But I do," for a second I paused to feel the impact of my words. _More than I ever thought I could with you, _"I love her."

* * *

**A/N:  
You probably don't want to hear me ramble right now, but it looks like I have a lot of apologizing to do.  
**_**I'm sorry that**_**:**

**1.  
I haven't updated in ages. Have you played the game of **_**Life**_**? It sucks.  
Really, as a reader I hate it when author's hiatus and I'm severely disappointed with myself. I thought I'd be done this story by now.**

**b)  
It's been a while so I'll probably have to do some editing because no beta + hiatus = bad/forgetful. Plus I never know when there's too little or much angst-whine writing.  
On a good note, fluff next chapter? 8D**

**Did I just mix up letters, numbers and symbols? Yes, yes I did.**

**Thank you everyone who kept reading/reviewing and encouraged me, keep on shoving me! 8D  
And ZoeNightshade2214 for keeping me inbox-company (sorry I didn't get your last message until now.)**

*About the Songbird story that I deleted. I was just using the book as a guideline; apparently it's been done already in... practically the exact same scenario. So I apologize to the author of that fanfiction for the potential misunderstanding, and thanks to the reviewer who corrected me.

**The song was _Razorblade_ by Blue October.  
I'm sorry if it seems kind of weird.


	26. ICU: Forget it, can we just sing?

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything besides the plot here, we know that. But what you **_**don't**_** know is…  
Jade and Cat are on the list of girls who could own **_**me**_**. Yeah, bet you didn't know that one. **

**They're right next to– I'm going to stop myself right there, because I actually typed up ones that came to mind immediately and there were around 10 different shippings alongside various random attractive women… the list would go on for ages. e_e Even longer than this huge paragraph I've just typed up and practically forced you to read. Who reads this stuff these days anyway? I do, and if you're still going apparently so do you. High five, bro.**

* * *

It's too fast, seriously way too fast. I mean, yeah, I've known her forever and everything. But we've been dating… how long have we even been dating for? My sense of time is shit right now, I have no idea. Except at the same time I can practically hear her say _'well of course you do, silly!' _if I just bring it up with the way I feel now. It's not romantic, it's not happy; it's panic and pain and worry and… all these horrible, horrible feelings that I wish I didn't have. It's _not_ too soon, but it is, you know? Like I said earlier, wasted time. It should feel romantic and sappy and all that other bullshit everyone says, and I can see how it would; you know, if there wasn't so much interfering crap going on.

In between thoughts I noticed my feet had started dragging me somewhere. They were probably taking me to meet Travis; to find Cat and spend as much time humanly possible with her. Hah, even my subconscious is stupidly hopeless for Cat.

A part of me wants to say that I hope you never love someone like this. It's like you can only be extremes with love, if you get what I'm saying here. If you're with them and happy then it's great, it's the best god damn feeling on the planet. But anything else is just agonizing. Never, ever let it happen to you; it'll tear you apart. I don't care if you never show emotion and nobody ever knows how you feel or you haven't cried in years. You'll hurt, and everyone'll know. It'll tease you and maybe even let you see what real love is like, but just a glimpse of it. Then as payment for the glimpse you saw? It'll rip you to pieces and leave you half alive. You'll find yourself bleeding on the cold concrete, wondering what life was like before.

"Jade?"

"Huh?" Blinking a couple times I realized that I'd been standing outside the room. My knuckles were white from holding the door handle too hard, and I quickly tried to recover myself. "What's up Travesty?"

Travis smiled weakly at me, in a way that said he saw through me rather than being offended at the new nickname. You see what I meant when I said everyone'll know? Fuck. "It's almost half past noon, we're late and I figure you want lunch?"

"Yeah." We exchanged a curt nod and proceeded to walk to the elevators in silence. I guess he knew better than to push it.

"I swiped the good stuff, by the way."

He smiled hopefully at me and I stopped unintentionally glaring at the elevator door. "What?"

"_Real_ chocolate pudding and jell-o. Not the fake stuff that everybody usually gets around here." Travis squinted and grinned at what I assumed was the memory of him sneaking in the real food. "I may have also ordered pizza. Uh, pizza_s_."

A small smirk in response. "Isn't that against some doctoral rule or some shit?"

"These rules you speak of, they sound blasphemous. Therefore I must have not been paying attention when they told us. Whoops?" He shrugged goofily. "Rules suck, anyway."

How on earth did he get picked for Chief? "Nice."

We made our way into the elevator and Travis pressed one of the buttons. It was time to answer the unspoken question.

"He said no."

"Ah," Travis tensed and then softened. "I'm sorry. Cat doesn't know, she'll be happy to see you nevertheless."

Still gloomy I managed to mutter out a word. "Right."

"I really shouldn't tell you, _but_…" He sang the 'but' and paused to smile at me in reassurance. If it wasn't something bad then it had to be good, right? "I think Cat pulled some favors with the peds patients, there may be a surprise waiting for you. It's funny, I think she wants to cheer _you_ up!"

The doom and gloom feeling was soon overwhelmed by… my heart warming? What the fuck. She knew me well, to the point where she accurately predicted how I'd feel. It was then that I realized; she wasn't just putting up a face, she wanted to go out with a smile. And if my girl wanted to go out with a smile, what kind of fucking idiot would I be if I stopped her? People deal in different ways, this was ours.

By the time we walked inside the room I'd pretty much pulled a 180. It was weird how one simple thing could just snap and change your entire way of thinking. Has that happened to you before, when something just opens your eyes? Well, there I was being Jade West; strangely happy edition. I pushed all thoughts of final moments aside and strut into the room looking forward to spending whatever time we had left laughing and making memories. At the very least I had to be strong, after all. I could be upset … after or right before, I guess. But this really wasn't the time. I shook my head to shake off the returning depression and grinned as I saw Cat sitting at a table, surrounded by kids.

"Jade!" Cat beamed at me and stood up to walk over.

A chorus of kids sang my name out in echo. "Jade!"

"Hey." I chuckled and made a slightly surprised noise as one of the kids hugged my leg.

The girl looked about… six, maybe? Looking around most of the kids looked around four to ten or so. But this one had eyes like Cat's and was also beaming brightly at me. "Hi Jade! We have a surprise for you."

"You were supposed to tell her that yet, stupid!" One of the boys yelled before shoving her lightly. This started the beginning of a waterworks convention that I really had no idea how to fix. Eyes wide and slightly frozen I looked up for help, but Cat was already on her knees intervening.

"It's okay! Jade still doesn't know what the surprise is, okay? And you're not stupid, just like I'm not stupid and they're not stupid and Travvie's not stupid and Jadey's not stupid." Cat passed the girl a napkin to wipe her eyes with and hugged her when she finished. "You guys better stop being mean!" Cat had a faint glare to her stare at the rest of them.

It was then that Travis had started herding the rest of the kids to the other side of the room. He was muttering something about patience, I guess he picked up I'm not too good with kids. Once those kids were taken to the other area Travis came back for the little girl. "I've got this, and I'll help them set up. You two just have a good lunch, yeah?" He didn't give us time to answer, just winked and carried the girl off on his shoulders.

"So…" Cat started playfully. "I think we've got another couple minutes or something for lunch, at most. I don't think Travvie'll be able to hold them off for long." I laughed softly in response. Taking my hand she led me over to the table where she'd been sitting. There were a couple pizza boxes, half of which were empty. "Isn't this kind of funny? I mean, the last time we had a thing we had pizza and look at this, it's pizza again! What a coincidence, ha!" _The last time we had a thing_. Ouch. "Oh Jade, I didn't mean it like that, it was good, we were good- we _are_ good, aren't we? I didn't want to push you about it or anything, but um, before everything happened it seemed like we were."

Suddenly I wasn't so hungry anymore. It could wait. I moved on the chair to sit cross-legged and pat my thighs to ask Cat to sit with me. Once she sat down I hugged her firmly from behind and rested my head on her shoulder. "Yeah, we're good. I'm good if you're good, Cat."

"'kay 'kay." She leaned back and relaxed into the embrace, letting me fully support her for a while. I guess the damage was starting to take its toll in her thoughts again.

Not wanting to ruin things I started to release Cat enough so that she could turn around in my lap. She murmured a soft sound to question my actions, so I nudged her lightly to face me. There was this horrible moment where I had the feeling of wanting to tell Cat that I love her, but instead I settled on a kiss. Not right now, that's for another time.

The amount of emotion in that kiss was inexplicable. No, it wasn't filled with passion or sorrow or any of the other cheesy shit you're going to ask about. I say it was inexplicable because it was; the best I can do for you is say that it was filled with us, things that words wouldn't be able to do justice for. Maybe if I wanted to try harder you could say care…? Love…? No, still not enough. It was about us; like that moment was just pure Jade and Cat. That was a sappy description but you get the picture.

I ended up being the one who pulled us apart, and I noticed that her eyes were brimming with tears. Kind of like the kiss told her I loved her or something, I don't know. Normally I'd stiffen up, but I think it would be okay if she got the feeling before I could tell her with words. Don't get me wrong, I'd definitely tell her with words sometime soon. It would have to be soon. Argh fuck. Still so much uncomfortable, shit.

We shared a broken smile and like out of a romantic cliché I kissed the tears off of her eyelids. I'm guessing it tickled because she giggled, or maybe it was just the gesture that was so out of character for me to do.

"_Aww._" The group of kids had returned and all of them seemed to think we were '_aww_' worthy, apparently.

I rolled my eyes. "Aren't you guys supposed to yell that you're going to get cooties or something?"

"Cooties are only from boys, silly." The sniffling girl from before piped in.

Cat draped her arms over my shoulders in a quick hug before giving me a chaste kiss. "Yeah, Jade! You're so silly." She punctuated this by kissing my nose, like it made a point that she wouldn't get cooties or something. "I'm pretty sure you're not a boy." Cat's smile was contagious, everyone was practically giggling with her.

My gaze jokingly lowered to my chest and when I looked up I caught Cat staring. "Uh _huh_," I drawled. "Looks like I'm definitely not a boy." I smirked at her rising blush.

"Um, s-so," she stuttered and I laughed as she swatted me playfully. "Did you want to–" I shook my head; I was fine putting off lunch for this. Cat slid off my lap and turned to the kids, there were about ten or so of them now that I was actually paying attention. "'kay, are you guys ready?"

Various versions of 'yes' sprung out from the kids as their heads bounced like the bobble heads old truckers used to put on their dashboards.

"Okay then, places!" Travis threw in from… somewhere that I couldn't see. I guess he was working on something? Two of the boys and one girl dashed off towards the sound of Travis' voice to assist him. Another boy and girl were busy setting up various instruments, like a medium sized keyboard, a guitar and some other things. I quirked an eyebrow when I saw them include a harmonica and kazoo. Really? Everybody else was carefully lined up and practicing breathing exercises with Cat.

A couple seconds later a makeshift stage appeared, and I noticed one pair of adult shoes and three pairs of hospital-issue kid slippers carrying it over. Aha, so that's what they were doing. They did a good job, if I must say. It looked like they spent a lot of time on it, and I figured that I could ask Cat about it later.

Once the stage was set up Cat checked in on the duo with the instruments. I looked away for two seconds and suddenly she'd appeared in front of me. "Whoa, girly. When did you get here."

"Since forever ago," Cat giggled. "I was just thinking…" I tilted my head to say 'yeah?' so she'd continue. "You haven't done anything to help, right?"

A slight frown on my part. "Nope. Can't exactly help plan something I just found out about, not to mention half of it's a surprise or something?"

"I should give you a job."

Seriously no idea where she's trying to get at with this. Confusion levels? Pretty high. Annoyed? Surprisingly I'm more amused instead. "Like what?"

Cat spun around so her back was to me and it seemed like she was looking for a job to give me. "I hereby declare that the great Jade West's job will now be… being my chair!"

A soft _oof_ noise came from me as she abruptly threw herself backwards onto me, and the room erupted into laughter. I caught her in my arms and tickled her gently. "Smart ass, I bet you planned this all along!"

"So…" Through giggles she tried to speak. "Much, hehehe, fun! Teehee, okay! Okay! I – hehe, I did!"

When I stopped tickling her one of the kids popped on stage and Cat gave them the thumbs up to go. I wasn't really surprised to hear that the kids' singing was pretty decent; Cat made a good singing teacher, plus she'd always been really great with children. I would've offered to help with the instrumental bits but the boy and girl handling the background music seemed… legitimately talented, actually. Maybe they'd had a lot of time to practice while in here. Ouch.

For the most part they sang things from Disney soundtracks. Songs from movies like _The Little Mermaid_, _The Aristocats, Beauty and the Beast,_ and to my surprise Travis managed to pull off the many voices of _Aladdin_'s _'Prince Ali'_. I mean, Robin Williams did it but I didn't expect Travis to be able to. The guy was definitely gaining new respect from me every now and then, as much as I'd hate to admit it.

I was clapping to what I assumed was the last performance when Cat hopped out of my lap and whispered something into a nearby boy's ear. He looked older than the rest of them, maybe preteens. Definitely not as sick as the rest of them, I guess you could describe him that way.

He nodded his head and Cat spoke up. "Hi! There's one more show, 'kay?"

The kids started to crowd around me like I had the best spot or something. Travis grinned from the sideline and the preteen boy made some sort of gesture in the direction of the music area.

"If you want you can sing along?" Cat kissed my cheek and glanced over at the preteen boy. "I'm just going to sing what I want to sing to you, you can sing what you want to sing to me, and what we don't want to sing he probably knows." Without waiting for my response Cat nodded at the instrumental duo.

Piano started the song off along with Cat's immediate voice.

_My heart's a stereo;  
it beats for yours, so listen close.  
Hear my thoughts in every no-oh-ote._

I started chuckling. The preteen boy was beatboxing in the background while throwing in some random words to accent Cat's singing. Picture that, man. Red velvet cupcake haired teenage girl singing with a preteen boy that's acting wangster and beatboxing in the background.

_Make me your radio and  
turn me up when you feel low.  
This melody was meant for you  
just __sing along __to my stereo._

Hey, wait a second. I know that smirk– No way, she wanted me to rap? Fuck's sake, I'm… uh, well. I guess they're right when they say you do stupid things for… yeah. Fuck.

_If I was just another dusty __record __on the shelf  
would you blow me off and play me like everybody else?  
If I ask you to scratch my back, could you __manage __that?  
Like it read well, check it Jadey, I can handle that._

I had let the boy sing the first bit just to confirm my suspicion. He laughed at me and Cat made an '_I don't know_' signal in response to his laughter. Or maybe it was to mock me, either way it was pretty funny. Then she smiled and motioned for me to sing and I rolled my eyes playfully.

_Furthermore, I apologize for any skipping tracks.  
Just the last boy that play me left a couple cracks.  
I used to- used to- used to used to, now I'm over that.  
Cause holding grudges over love is __ancient artifacts._

Cat winked at me as she danced and I grinned, we'd be singing the next verse together.

_If I could only find a note to make you understand.  
I'd sing it softly in your ear and__ grab you by the hands.  
Keep myself inside your head, like your favorite tune,  
and know my heart is a stereo that only plays for you._

The kids were starting to dance, so I figured why not? Cat gestured for me to join her and I danced on over to her as she sang her part again. She swayed close to me as though we were dancing in a club and I mimicked her movements.

_My heart's a stereo;  
it beats for yours, so listen close.  
Hear my thoughts in every no-oh-ote._

_Make me your radio and  
turn me up when you feel low.  
This melody was meant for you  
just __sing along __to my stereo._

All of us sang the next part in echo of each other, hell, even the bandies sang with us. It was a brilliant feeling, practically the reason why I enjoy the arts.

_Oh oh oh oh oh. To my stereo.  
Oh oh oh oh oh. So __sing along __to my stereo._

Laughing, I let the boy know he could have all of the next verse. He made a better rapper than I did, anyway.

_If I was an old__school__ fifty pound boombox  
would you hold me on your shoulder wherever you walk?  
Would you turn my volume up before of the cops  
and crank it higher every time they told you to stop.  
And all I ask is that you don't get mad at me  
when you have to purchase mad D batteries.  
Appreciate every mix tape your friends make,  
you never know we come and go like we're on the interstate._

When he finished we nodded our heads in unison at Cat, the rest of the song was hers. She looked a little surprised; I think she thought I'd want to sing it with her or something. But by then I'd already gotten an idea of my own.

_I think finally found a note to make you understand,  
if you can hear it ,__sing along __and take me by the hands.  
Keep myself inside your head, like your favorite tune  
and know my heart is a stereo that only plays for you._

Grinning I took her hands and twirled her around into a quick dip. Then Cat surprised me by spinning herself until her back was to my front. I was so caught off guard that she had to move my hands to her hips as she moved about.

_My heart's a stereo;  
it beats for yours, so listen close.  
Hear my thoughts in every no-oh-ote._

_Make me your radio and  
turn me up when you feel low.  
This melody was meant for you  
just __sing along __to my stereo._

Well, she could sing the rest of the song herself with the exception of the next bit. We'd always join her for the echoing _Oh_s.

_Oh oh oh oh oh. To my stereo.  
Oh oh oh oh oh. So __sing along __to my stereo._

It got quiet, the music was faint and everybody stopped shuffling so that only Cat's voice could be heard singing the bridge.

_I only pray you never leave me behind  
because good __music __can be so hard to find.  
I take your hand and hold it closer to mine;  
thought love was dead, but now you're changing my mind!_

That was _it_. I picked her up and she held onto my shoulders while using her legs to hold onto my waist. I think she was concerned that I wouldn't be able to continue holding her up on my own, but she didn't need to worry. Cat was light as a feather; especially while I was feeling euphoric like this. This made me feel more … awesome, for lack of words, than any drug ever could.

_My heart's a stereo;  
it beats for yours, so listen close.  
Hear my thoughts in every no-oh-ote._

_Make me your radio and  
turn me up when you feel low.  
This melody was meant for you  
just __sing along __to my stereo._

_Oh oh oh oh oh. To my stereo.  
Oh oh oh oh oh. So __sing along __to my stereo._

Everyone else sang the last repeat for Cat because she was too preoccupied with me. Kissing someone while they're smiling, while you're smiling, it's contagious; have I said that before? It's fan-fucking-tastic. Remember what I said earlier about love being extremes? Yeah, this is it. Sure she didn't say it with words, but I could feel it?

It wouldn't always feel like this, I know that. It's like a fire, you know? It can be extremely hot if you overfeed it, but it'll die faster that way. Then again, if you don't take care of it at all it'll burn out. The point is to nourish it and keep it at a comfortable level, sometimes turning up the heat until it burns, but when that's over you don't let it simmer out.

… Yeah, I don't know where that came from, we're going to forget I said that. Weird philosophical shit.

Ignoring the incessant sting of limited time and the reminder of death bed love confessions, I let myself enjoy these moments with her so that they would be genuine. The last thing I'd want for her are white lies, and even if you put that aside I still have something urgent to distract myself with. No, really, what am I going to sing back to Cat?

* * *

**A/N:  
I could've done this chapter a _lot_ differently, please tell me what you think of this version. **

******Holy shit that was a long chapter.  
It's five thirty in the morning and I haven't slept, so there's bound to be mistakes - Sorry!**

**Now, I do have a song in mind for Jade to sing, but it's really flexible (Hi, I'm always ashamed of the music I pick).  
If you guys have any ideas on what I should have her sing for the next chapter, please let me know.  
**

**I'm also curious, if I got a twitter or tumblr, would any of you follow/join me on it?  
It'd be easier for me to ask questions and update you, I think.  
Plus with this limited time offer you could also potentially nag me to death on it if I take too long again!  
SOUNDS GOOD, YEAH? 8D**

**Anyhow. Thanks for the support, bros. Keep it up! You know the drill.  
SEND AN OPINION (read: send me hugs), SEND A REVIEW. 8D**

*_The song is Stereo Hearts by Gym Class Heros featuring Adam Levine (from Maroon 5).  
_I was listening to the radio while trying to find a song for these two to sing and after hours I was like YOU KNOW WHAT, THE NEXT ONE ON THE RADIO- hey, it works.


	27. ICU: Don't Wait, Do Something

**Disclaimer: Do you remember Chapter 4's disclaimer? Well, I did find/kiss the girl of my dreams! I just didn't get turned into a magical Hamster, and I'm pretty sure that was part of the ViCTORiOUS ownership deal, so... still no luck with that. I know, I know, you're upset. It's okay. Next time, lads.**

* * *

After a good five or so minutes of twirling Cat around I started feeling tired, and so I carefully dropped her off onto a chair and slid into the one next to her. A minute later an acoustic guitar came running over- wait, what? Oh. One of the kids had run over with a guitar and proceeded to jump into my lap after putting it down. "Um...?" I questioned, looking back and forth between Travis, Cat and the girl beaming at me from my lap.

Cat giggled as Travis walked over and picked the young girl up. "How about we leave these two alone for a little bit, okay?"

A murmur of disapproval was what he got in response. I think I heard a couple _'aww'_s, _'gross'_ es, and '_but I want to hear her sing!_'s in there somewhere. Possibly fake tears, even.

"I have more chocolate pudding in the fridge."

Silence, as many eyebrows shot up in skeptical questioning.

"Real chocolate pudding. No..._ trollin'_." Travis looked awkwardly at Cat, who smiled and gave him a thumbs-up. Of course she would teach them words like 'trolling'.

And then a stampede of children stormed out the door, almost knocking everything over in their way. Travis saluted us jokingly before scuttling out to herd them.

"Hi." Cat started, somehow licking a spoonful of pudding that she'd pulled out of somewhere.

I raised an eyebrow and picked up the guitar leaning near me. It was a bit worn down but felt nice in my hands. "Hi..." My voice trailed off as I strummed a couple chords and continued thinking about what song lyrics I wanted to dedicate to her. They could be the last ones I'd be able to, after all... No, no. I'd decided already. It had to be something peppy. There goes _Say You'll Haunt Me_ and _Famous Last Words_.

My thoughts were interrupted by Cat's gentle voice. "I know you want to sing something that you don't want to sing." She paused and frowned for a second, as if also confused by her sentence. "Um, I think you want to sing something that's sad, and that will make you feel bad. And maybe you think that it'll make me feel bad? But it won't, I wanted to tell you that it won't, because I sang something happy so that you could sing what you want to. I want to hear whatever you want to sing for me. You know me, and I know you, so sing what you will for me and I'll understand."

I frowned. There was something else that I had a problem with; Beck was right. I'd changed myself a lot because of Cat. It was all natural of course, but was I ready for her to see-

"I won't think you're clingy." A barely audible whisper, I almost didn't catch it. I stopped strumming and turned to see the sullen look of dull eyes again. "I'm always clingy, and... you only have so long to cling for, anyway." Cat smiled at me through tear brimmed eyes, as if both proud and ashamed of her reasoning. I leaned over the guitar to try and offer her a hug, and she flinched slightly. "It's okay, Jade. It's okay." It sounded more for herself than me, and it continued to break my heart.

_I hate feeling like this,  
I'm so tired of tryin' to fight this.  
I'm asleep and all I dream of is waking to you._

Singing in a broken whisper, I started looking for the correct chords. This song was for the now, and if she understood like she said she would, then... she would know.

_Tell me that you will listen,  
your touch is what I'm missing.  
And the more I hide I realize I'm slowly losing you._

I raised my voice to sing for real, because if this is what she wanted, then who was I to deny her?

_Comatose,  
I'll never wake up without an overdose of you._

The blunt emotion of the lyrics, the slap in the face from reality that I'd been trying to shield us from. It was starting to make sense why she wanted me to do it. I wanted to tell her she couldn't give up, but it was conflicting – what could I do for her? Nothing, I couldn't come up with _anything_.

_I don't wanna live,  
I don't wanna breathe;  
'less I feel you next to me.  
You take the pain I feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real.  
I don't wanna sleep,  
I don't wanna dream;  
'cause my dreams don't comfort me,  
the way you make me feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real._

My cue was purposely missed as Cat filled in the next verse. As I said earlier, if she understood like she said she would then she knew these lines were hers if she so wanted.

_I hate living without you,  
dead wrong to ever doubt you;  
but my demons lay in waiting,  
tempting me away.  
Oh, how I adore you,  
Oh, how I thirst for you,  
Oh, how I need you._

It wasn't just about the honesty or bluntness of the lyrics; I was more... scared, of how much trust I was giving away to her with this. It wasn't her that I didn't trust, it was me. I'm as blunt and honest as I want to be, we all know it; it's what makes me who I am. Just, none of them have mattered enough for me to care, you see? If they were to just let me fall, I could shrug my shoulders in indifference. I'd see it coming and everything. Cat matters, so... she could shatter me. It's a secret I've been keeping hidden for self preservation, to keep me going. I thought it was enough alone, but somehow she saw through it and offered me more.

_Comatose,  
I'll never wake without an overdose of you._

_I don't wanna live,  
I don't wanna breathe;  
'less I feel you next to me.  
You take the pain I feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real.  
I don't wanna sleep,  
I don't wanna dream;  
'cause my dreams don't comfort me,  
the way you make me feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real._

I went to repeat the chorus but she continued, and so I let her. I think she wanted me to hear the feeling in her voice, as it matched mine.

_Breathing life,  
waking up.  
My eyes  
open up._

Part growl, the rest a yell, alone I had managed to form the perfect verse of anguish.

_Comatose,  
I'll never wake without an overdose of you._

_I don't wanna live,  
I don't wanna breathe;  
'less I feel you next to me.  
You take the pain I feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real.  
I don't wanna sleep,  
I don't wanna dream;  
'cause my dreams don't comfort me,  
the way you make me feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real._

When the chorus repeated for a third time we sang together, but neither of us could look at the other. At a nearby window I saw Travis eavesdropping, although respectfully giving us some privacy. He too looked pained at our predicament; he could have been crying though I wasn't sure, I didn't really pay him much attention. Cat had stopped singing and started crying instead, silent tears streaming down her beautiful face.

_Oh, how I adore you;  
wakin' up to you never felt so real.  
Oh, how I thirst for you;  
wakin' up to you never felt so real.  
Oh, how I adore you-_

I finally put the guitar down and went back to whisper-singing. It fit, and it was all I could do to keep from breaking down at the sight of Cat. She was wholeheartedly crying again, her sobs resonating around the room as her body heaved with pain.

_Oh,  
the way you make me feel,  
waking up to you never felt so real._

Cat finally let me hold her, and I whispered the last three lines in her ear. I felt the weight of everything that had happened in the last few weeks. All the suffering, all her acts of trying to stay bubbly and strong. The way currently she tried with no avail to stop the uncontrollable crying. How there was nothing I could do but hold her and feel my hopelessness turn into tears of my own, ones that would only blend with hers. It was something that I had hoped would never happen to us.

It was pretty late by the time that Travis decided that it would be safe for him to stand in the doorway. Cat was still kind of crying, in that way when you can't stop but have run out of tears. I just sat there, conflicted. How was I supposed to think like this? I was quick to understand that she'd wanted someone to be there when she broke, but it left me... in a place unimaginable. What about all the things we'd never get to do? We were supposed to prove the world wrong. She was supposed to prove _me_ wrong.

"I'll sign the papers so you can leave the hospital and I'll deal with your parents. Don't just wait here for something to happen." Numbed by the instinctive reflex to shield away pain, I didn't register that Travis had another meaning to what he had said.

* * *

**A/N:**

**Thanks for still reading and reviewing (and song suggestions), even when I was inactive.  
Keep 'em coming! You know I enjoy the love.  
And you probably don't want to hear my excuses. HOWEVER, I do have an ending for this.**

******I didn't ever say Cat was going to die, did I?  
I didn't say they'd have an unhappy ending, did I?  
... Then again, I never said she'd live, either.  
**_**Ooh**_**. I'm **_**so **__**bad**_**. Kidding, but I do have Aces up my sleeve.  
For which side, you'll have to read and find out!**

**Oh, and thanks for nominating me for The Topaz Awards 2012-  
Holy shit, I won **_**Best Cade**_**? I love all of you LOL.  
WELL NOW I'M HYPED 8D**

**P.S. As usual this is unbeta'd and it's been forever so... some of this chapter may clash with the previous ones. I will go looking for those things eventually and edit the chapter, but here's the gist of it. Sorry it's so short.**


	28. ICU: It's for the Best

**Disclaimer: Oh gosh, it's been so long that I don't remember what my old disclaimers were.  
Still don't own anything! What a shocker, right? I know, you expect more from me. What are you, my parents?  
**

* * *

Cat had insisted on saying goodbye to her gang of followers in the Pediatrics unit before leaving, and Travis had disappeared into his doctor-cave to find release forms and whatever else he needed to do.

I took this alone time as an opportunity to pack Cat's things up for her. There wasn't much to bring with us, but I needed something to do. My mind was racing desperately to find an option, any form of solution. Maybe I could find a black market organ donor? I have access to the West family foundation funds, money shouldn't be a problem. But how long would that take, would I find someone in time? They said I was a match, maybe just find an under the table surgeon? But again, how would I even begin to find somebody to help me with that in less than a week.

Furiously zipping up Cat's backpack, I failed to notice some surrounding things. First of all, I'd cut my hand open on the zipper somehow, and secondly, I wasn't alone in the room anymore.

A soft hand with some handy gauze bandaging stopped my rampaging around the room. Cat looked paler- yellower? Definitely yellower than I remembered, fuck. She sat down and patted the spot next to her so that I'd sit too. After rubbing her hand lightly against the outside of my arm, Cat started on silently tending to my cut hand.

"Do you remember," she broke the silence and stopped to smile bashfully, "when we were kids, and I was too scared to get out of the tree I climbed?"

"I asked you if that was where you got your name from." I chuckled, wincing a little when she applied rubbing alcohol.

Cat finished wrapping my hand and shoved me gently. She was trying to lighten the mood. "Yeah, and you made me cry, you big meanie."

"But I came back for you eventually." I scoffed.

Cat skimmed her hand over my shoulders and I relaxed them. Hell, I didn't even realize I was tense to begin with. "You were so cute threatening Robbie for his fireman hat, coming to rescue me and everything."

"You saw that?" She nodded as her hand continued its way up to cup my face. I smiled and enjoyed the comfort of her softness before kissing her palm. "I made for a pretty shitty ass fireman."

"You still rescued me, though." She murmured, leaning her head in a little. This was different, more serious, and much less happy than before.

It killed me, because it meant she had accepted it.

Still, I leaned in and filled the gap between us instead of bantering with her. Our kisses were slow and soft; they were laced with longing, tainted by sorrow and fear. For a brief moment I broke the chain of kisses, just to scoop her up into my lap. Cat held onto me with what little might she had left, and I reassured her that I wouldn't let her fall. Eventually she moved to caress my face, neck and shoulders, as though she never wanted to forget their feeling.

I tilted my head, nuzzling my face against her cheek before deciding on trying something daring. It was a very pleasant surprise to hear her gasp when I kissed the crook of her neck. Looking up, I noticed Cat was flushed.

"Did… you…" She started, her eyes showing a jumbled clump of emotions.

Realizing what she was getting at, I smiled sadly and shook my head. How bittersweet. "No, I just felt like you'd like that. You've always been sensitive. I wouldn't rush those types of things."

"We don't really have time, if we don't rush." Cat mumbled under her breath, as though she didn't really want me to hear that. But I did, I was in close enough proximity that I could even hear her breathing.

It got quiet, after that. I couldn't reassure her that there'd be plenty of time, not like I was supposed to be able to. I couldn't be in denial about it, that would only cause her more heartache. But agreeing with her, well, that was no better.

The silence carried on until I heard the soft sound of Cat snoring on my shoulder. Purring more like, but still classified as snoring nonetheless. I hugged her close to me as she slept, sighing happily when I got past the horrible hospital smell and could breathe in Cat's scent. Her smell was intoxicating; if I could bottle it up and sell it as happiness, I would. Then again, I wouldn't want anyone but me to have it.

I was beginning to note how tiny and fragile she felt in my arms, when I saw Travis coming down the hallway towards us. Wiggling my eyebrows and jerking my neck a little, I got his attention enough for him to make a more silent entrance.

"Mr. and Mrs. Valentine said they had to go back to their… I think it was a convention or something, I stopped listening after they said they wouldn't be home for a couple days." An angry glare flashed on his face. "I mean, your kid has a week left and you're worried about _clients_? What kind of-"

Cat stirred a little, and Travis winced apologetically. I rubbed my hand on Cat's knee to comfort her, and we waited until her snoring resumed before continuing our conversation.

"I'm going to guess that her brother went back to his dorms," I ground my teeth. "And that he probably gave them and you hell for wasting his time, right?"

"I don't understand how those… those _people_ can be related to someone as sweet as Cat." They'd clearly gone too far with Travis.

I smiled sadly – damn, that's becoming a bad habit. "We should hate them for it, but if they were different, she would be too." He nodded. "Or at least, that's what I tell myself so I don't try to murder them."

Travis laughed before pulling out a clipboard from who knows where. "These are her release papers, she just needs to sign them. You'll be free to take her home after that, but she'll need some things. Cat'll need pain medication, if you're not going to be around all the time she'll need-"

"I'll be around," I interrupted. "I probably won't even go home. There's nothing for me there, there's no point going unless I have no reason to stay." Is there some part of the grieving process where you go crazy? I'm sure there must be, because here I am, sounding crazy. "I mean, she won't need a nurse."

"Okay. There's a pharmacy in the first floor lobby, you can stop by there for her medication on the way out." He took out a couple slips of paper from his pocket; they were covered in scribbles of medication I'd never heard of. "She's in pain, Jade. There's a recent infection that's spreading, we offered to fix it for her but she said she was going to die anyway; it's only going to worsen from today. She's going to need strong prescriptions, and… I don't know how lucid she's going to be in the last couple days."

"How is…" I blinked hard, keeping my eyes closed. "How is it going to…?"

My eyes were watery when I opened them, but I could tell Travis wasn't doing much better than I was. "You probably noticed she's rather yellow. She's a little moody, but that's a given. Cat trembles a lot, but I think she's been trying to restrain it since you've woken up. She might have seizures or tremors in a couple days. Her appetite's mostly gone, and she hasn't really been… using the bathroom anymore."

"Wouldn't it be better if she stayed here, then?" I thought out loud, since I'd be for whatever is best for Cat.

"Technically?" Travis sighed. "Maybe, I guess. But she wants to go home with you. It's all she's wanted since the two of you got here. It was most of what she talked about whenever someone mentioned… anything, really."

I didn't really know what to say to that, so I just stared at the dying girl in my arms. A couple minutes passed before I came up with something to say. "There's really nothing we can do for her?"

"I tried, Jade. I tried, I really did." The good doctor looked tired, we were taking a heavy toll on him. "Even if I could plead Cat's case to the board, it would take too long."

"So we pump her with meds until she's too drugged to recognize death." I muttered angrily.

Travis shook his head and massaged his temples, as though he was also racking his brain for options. "Normally I would say you could try something farfetched, like a stem cell graft, because she doesn't need much to recover. She just needs a little, that way it could attach and grow… It's just not enough to function properly right now. Grafts or a small donation would be like when kids reattach a finger." I noticed he was talking more to himself than to me. "She's high on the emergency donor waiting list because of the circumstances, but not enough donations are made; healthy donors don't die all that often. God damn it, she only needs a piece, and she needs it now."

"Doctor." Noting what his outbursts very carefully, I realized that maybe I had gone a little crazy. He looked at me as if I was, since I sounded a little odd. "Would you mind getting Cat's pain medication for me, instead? I don't want to leave her side."

"If you want? I won't have a break for another couple hours, though. Cat should be fine until then, but do you really want to stay here and wait?" Travis questioned me skeptically, and with good reason.

"Yeah, I think that's a good idea." I said, not convincing him nor myself.

Travis packed up his things and left the release forms on a bedside table. "Okay then." He paused, as though he was contemplating if he should figure out why I was acting weird or not. "I have rounds to do, but I'll be back to check up on the two of you every once in a while. There's an emergency button above the bed that you can hit if you need to call for assistance, alright?"

I nodded, and he left.

Slowly, I carried Cat so that I could turn and place her on the bed. She whined and stirred slightly, holding on to me as I tried to leave and groggily asking where I was going.

"I'm going to go find you something that'll make you feel better," I kissed her nose before cupping her face with my hand and stroking her cheek with my thumb. "Okay?"

She groaned slightly. "But I already took my medicines. How long ago was that, did I sleep for a long time? Ask the nice nurse ladies when I can take more, for me?"

"Don't worry about that, I'll take care of it." I kissed her cheek and nuzzled her face."I'll take care of you, Cat. You just rest, I'll be right back."

"Yes nurse Jadey." Cat smiled at her own joke, but didn't giggle endlessly like she usually would.

I wanted as much physical contact as possible, to show her how much I love her and also to memorize her feeling. She just smiled as I covered her face in kisses. I really didn't want to leave her, but there were important things to be done. Life or death kind of things.

After dragging myself away from Cat, I stopped at the door to ask one more question. "Hey Cat?"

Her eyes fluttered open, her eyelids weighed down by lack of sleep. "Mmm?"

"Have you always loved me?" My voice cracked and it was barely higher than a whisper, so I hoped she'd heard me correctly; I'd be a mess if I had to repeat my question.

Cat sighed contently, closing her eyes to reminisce. "As long as I can remember, Jadey. I've always waited for you to notice; it was you, is you, will always be you." She paused for a moment and smiled before singing softly. "_I will love you until my dying day._"

"_Come what may._" I sang back, knowing she would drift to sleep with my voice.

Sure enough, Cat started snoring again and so I left. I made my way to the hospital lobby, finding that I was correct about my theory that the lobby would be adjoined with the emergency rooms. Being careful not to be spotted by too many of the hospital staff, I slithered my way through the busy ER. There must've been an accident, some sort of pile up or something; the place was packed and people were yelling all over the place. Luckily, nobody noticed me. They probably thought I was a bored patient or relative, or just someone using the bathroom.

I waited as patiently as I could to watch the ER staff's habits, and eventually it paid off – I managed to swipe what I was looking for. The nurses and doctors might be confused for a minute, but they'd catch on soon enough. I'm sure there has to be some sort of protocol for that kind of thing, anyway.

Realizing that meant I didn't have much time, I quickly jumped in the next elevator to Cat's floor. I didn't have to be careful now, if anybody caught me I was just… using the bathroom.

After I made it to our room without any problems, I waved my hand in front of Cat's face to make sure she was asleep. I snapped my fingers a few times and whispered her name - all I got in response was her snores. Good, I didn't want her waking up for this, she'd kill me and it'd be horrifying.

Understatement, it'd be fucking traumatic.

… It'd probably be fucking traumatic either way.

I shook my head and closed my eyes. I let memories flood my imagination; all the times I dismissed Cat's longing stares, the fake happiness she produced for Beck and I. All the hurt I'd put her through, all the misery that I'd ignored. And now? Now, the love that was finally reciprocated. After all this time, she- we, could be happy. I finally stopped being stupid, and for what?

Making sure that there wasn't any nearby staff to notice my suspicious behavior, I laid down on the floor.

If I do or don't believe in a God, I'll never know. But either way, what hope is there for the world if the only genuinely good person I know is allowed to die like this?

The universe is a cruel, and twister master.

But I've never believed in fate, I've always said thought that we're the masters of our own fate.

Then, I pulled out the scalpel I'd so stealthily stolen.

Bracing myself, I ground my teeth when the blade slid in. As I sliced it across my torso, I almost cried out in pain. There wasn't enough time to wait to steal some sort of painkillers. Instead, I groaned and bit my lip hard enough to taste blood. My breathing started to quicken from silencing myself, and there were tears flowing freely down my face.

I heard the scalpel clink as it hit the floor, my hands were shaking too hard to hold onto it anymore.

I felt the blood spill around me.

This was it. It had to work.

"Oh, Jade. _No_."

Not realizing I'd shut my eyes, I opened them to see Cat staring back at me in horror. She'd gasped every word, like it was all unbelievable.

Why had she gotten up? I made sure she was asleep, and I didn't make that much noise, or so I hoped. She wasn't meant to see this, I'd decided the room was best because they could harvest and transplant as soon as possible? Or did I just want to be by her side, when this happened? My thoughts weren't coherent, so I let go.

"You'll understand, Cat." I breathed heavily. She was slamming her hand on the emergency button so hard that she was making herself bleed.

I had more to say, I think. Probably things like "I love you", or explaining what I was doing, like "I can't live without you" or something. Yeah, crazy things.

But it was getting harder and harder to function, so I closed my eyes instead.

Now they'd have to donate a part, if not all, of my liver to Cat, right? I mean, I opened myself up and everything. Surely they couldn't pass that opportunity up.

She has a chance at living now, maybe. There could be many possible outcomes, I knew that. But it didn't matter if I died, because either I died saving the girl I love, or I died along with her. And either way, that's okay with me.

Love and death, they make you crazy.

The last few things that I heard were Cat's repeated pleas of 'I love you', and the distant stomping of doctors who would try to save me.

… Or maybe that was just my heartbeat fading away.

* * *

**A/N [03/07/13]:  
Hello- whoa now ./holds hands up. Please don't shoot.  
**

**I won't bore you with excuses and I won't anger you with more empty promises.  
But do keep in mind that I really am sorry, and I do want to finish this story.**

**You read correctly, it's not done yet.**

**The medical 'facts' are probably inaccurate because I've been using Google and twisting some things to my liking (tl;dr - don't source me for your Liver Failure essay). It's also been over a year, so I don't remember if parts clash with each other anymore. That's what I get for not having a Beta. Sorry about that.**

**If you'd like to nag me to death or something, I do have Tumblr now. Ask, and I'll send it your way.**

**p.s., one thing hasn't changed - it's 5am as I'm publishing this, so horrible grammar/spelling/accidental plot problems are my bad.**


End file.
